Siddique Malik
Mon, November 29, 2021
It’s America’s duty to spearhead a solution to an acute humanitarian crisis that has struck Europe, not just because America’s inaction over an earlier related event is a reason for the problem’s emergence, but also because America owes it to its moral leadership. America’s failure to act would be tantamount to relinquishing that leadership.
The crisis I am talking about is the refugee crisis at the Belarusian-Polish border. Gut-wrenching pictures of helpless refugees, including small children, gathered against barbed wires are painful reminders of little children being snatched from the arms of their parents and then locked up in cages and horse-mounted American border guards whipping fellow human beings at the US-Mexico border. Humanity must end its callousness towards the Almighty’s helpless creations whose only crime is to run from tyranny and misery. And America must provide political and moral leadership on that much-needed change of heart.
November 23, 2021: A migrant holds his child as he waits to get meal during a snowfall outside a logistics center at the checkpoint "Kuznitsa" at the Belarus-Poland border near Grodno, Belarus. Belarusian authorities say they have helped more than 100 migrants leave the country on Monday and more are prepared to leave Tuesday, a statement that comes after almost two weeks tensions at on the Belarus' border with Poland, where hundreds of migrants remain stuck.
Positioned behind the refugees are Belarusian border guards who let the incoming refugees join the stranded group. But until recently, Belarus was not letting anyone from the group retreat back into Belarus. On the other side of the barbed wires, Polish border guards are enforcing a heartless policy of their government to deny refugees entry into Poland and hearings of their asylum applications that, under the international law, constitute Poland’s and the European Union’s duty.
The result is a terrible humanitarian crisis. People are stranded in the open air in bitter European winter. They have no access to food, water, medicines and other basic necessities of life. The other day, the refugees noticed a young man among them was motionless. When they checked him, they realized he had frozen to death overnight.
Poland is a member of the European Union, but it, along with another member, Hungary, has been locked in an ongoing battle with the E.U. over those two countries’ lackadaisical attitude towards judicial independence and freedom of speech. The E.U. wants all its members to follow its basic standards on those subjects. But that’s hypocritical. When it comes to human rights of the above-mentioned refugees, E.U’s silence over Polish policy of denying them due process is nothing but criminal. That heightens the urgency for the United States to fill the leadership vacuum on the matter.
The crisis was created by Alexander Lukashenko, the Belarusian dictator. It was his attempt to get back at the E.U. that imposed sanctions on his thuggish regime for rigging the 2020 elections that his opponent, Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, won. But Lukashenko reacted to the election results the way dictators generally do. He changed the election results, refused to relinquish power, and threatened Tikhanovskaya and her children. She, along with her children, fled to neighboring Lithuania.
A movement by the Belarusian people to force Lukashenko to accept the genuine election results ensued. Last May, Lukashenko committed an act of air piracy by forcing a Ryanair jet overflying Belarus – Ryanair is based in Ireland, another EU member – to land in Belarus and then arresting an opposition activist who was on board that jet.
Now, Lukashenko’s embassies in and around various strife-ridden countries – Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan, etc. – in cahoots with human smugglers, are enticing people to attempt to enter the E.U. Once those misguided and exploited people arrive in Belarus, buses transport them to the Polish border. That is Lukashenko’s way of getting even with the E.U.
America can take a two-pronged approach to the situation, and it must.
America has always taken acts of air piracy very seriously. In 1992, after then-Libyan dictator, Muammar Gaddafi, was caught red-handed for his role in attacking international airliners, America moved the United Nations Security Council to impose an air embargo on Libya that brought Gaddafi to his knees. I am surprised, neither E.U. nor America made a similar move against Belarus after Lukashenko’s act of air piracy.
In earnest, the Russia of 1992 was very different than today’s Russia. It had just inherited veto power from the Soviet Union that collapsed in December 1991. At the time of the Security Council vote over Gaddafi’s criminal behavior, Russia was led by its first post-Soviet president, Boris Yelstin, who was pro-West.
Vladimir Putin is not only not pro-West, he will do anything in his power to stymie the West. And that explains Lukashenko’s behavior. He has Putin’s support. Putin generally does not act positively until and unless encouraged by America.
Considering the vastness of the areas in which Russia needs America, I am sure, America can find a morsel to throw at Putin as a quid pro quo. I would suggest finding a morsel juicy enough for Putin to look the other way as America and E.U. seek a comprehensive solution to Lukashenko’s thuggery and force him to transfer power to Tikhanovskaya. That would be a win-win-win situation. It would resolve the refugee issue, restore democracy in Belarus and send a shiver down the spine of dictators everywhere.
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If America does not have even that much leeway over Russia, that means America’s foreign policy options are very limited and basically subject to Putin’s whims. In that situation, the talk of being the leader of the free world is just nonsense. If America cannot even help sustain democracy and support human rights in the heart of Europe, how is it going to deal with Russia’s and China’s incursions into the far corners of the world?
The above action will take time that the stranded refugees don’t have. Whether or not America has the ability and the will to take that concrete action, it must initiate the second prong of my two-pronged suggestion: President Joe Biden must immediately call the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, and ask her to make Poland allow the refugees into Poland, house them in temporary shelters and start processing their asylum applications.
On November 15, the E.U. stiffened the sanctions on Belarus. Two days later, to deflect attention from its nefarious role in the crisis, Lukashenko started to allow stranded refugees to retreat back into Belarus and provide them shelter. That was in contrast to Poland firing tear gas shells and water cannons on them. Shame on E.U. for lecturing Poland and Hungary on freedom and due process! It needs a lecture itself.
Tragically, conspicuous by its absence is American action without which the situation won’t improve. A dictator is winning the war of optics while America is too busy being the leader of the free world to help those seeking freedom.
Siddique Malik is an observer of sociopolitical affairs. Find him @The SummerOf1787.
This article originally appeared on Louisville Courier Journal: America must help refugees or it's not the leader of the free world | Opinion
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