Latvia warns of risk of ‘incident’ between NATO and Russia

PanARMENIAN.Net - The “weaponisation” of migration by Belarus on its border with Lithuania and an imminent military exercise involving Russian and Belarusian troops risks an “incident” with NATO troops in the Baltic states or Poland, said Latvia’s foreign minister.

Edgars Rinkevics told the Financial Times there was an increased chance of “misunderstandings, some actions that are not approved by superiors” when Russia’s Zapad military exercise takes place next month.

“You have a border crisis, you have a major military exercise going on at the borders of NATO countries, you also have increased presence on our side, the Lithuanian side, Estonian side, Polish side of border guards, and military formations. Of course, this is increasing the possibility of incidents,” Rinkevics said.

There is growing unease in both the Baltic states and Brussels over the actions of the regime of Belarusian president Alexander Lukashenko after a flawed election last year and the forced landing of an intra-EU flight in May to seize a journalist-activist. Baltic officials say his latest tactic is to offer migrants from Iraq, Syria or several African countries a package that includes passage to the Lithuanian border. More than 4,000 migrants have crossed into Lithuania this year alone, more than 50 times the number that entered last year.

Rinkevics said this was “a very clear case of hybrid warfare” by deliberately using migration to target the EU and Lithuania.

“The migrants are actually being used as the weapon. The longer we live in this 21st century, the scarier it becomes. Things that we couldn’t imagine that could be used, they are being used,” he said.

Latvia’s foreign minister said he was encouraged by Iraq’s decision to suspend flights to Minsk, which, combined with Lithuanian border guards’ new tactic to “push back” migrants towards Belarus, has led to a significant decrease in the numbers crossing the frontier in recent days.

Tensions in the Baltic states rise every four years when Russia’s annual military exercises move to its western district bordering Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. But Rinkevics said that this year’s Zapad exercise was particularly sensitive because of the “ongoing hybrid warfare element”.

He added: “Definitely this has rather high potential for incidents. Of course, if somebody is planning some deliberate provocations then one can see that. But I honestly don’t think there’s an interest to escalate that to a full-scale military provocation.”