MINSK. May 2 (Interfax) - The construction of a barrier on the Polish-Belarusian border will be completed this summer, Polish Border Guard spokesperson Anna Michalska said in an interview with the Polish Press Agency.
"A total of 206 kilometers of an electronic barrier, equipped with cameras and motion sensors, have been built on the border with Belarus. Only 150 meters of the last section have yet to be built," Michalska said.
She said that the unequipped area is flooded for now, and the construction will become possible in summer when the water level in the Narew River drops.
"Almost the entire barrier is working, and everything that happens on the border is being recorded," Michalska said. In particular, 8,000 attempts to cross the Polish-Belarusian border illegally were registered this year, compared to 15,700 attempts of the kind throughout 2022.
Earlier, Poland said it was planning to complete the construction of the electronic barrier on the border with Belarus by the end of 2022. However, these plans were not implemented because of the late delivery of thermal imagers.
Poland started building an electronic barrier on the border with Belarus in June 2022. It was reported that Poland planned to install 11 containers with electronic control systems integrated into them, including night-vision cameras, thermal imagers, and dozens of kilometers of detection cables. The electronic fence's operations are monitored from a surveillance center in Bialystok.
In January 2022, Poland started building a 186-kilometer long and 5.5-meter-high barbed wire-topped metal fence on the border with Belarus. It announced the completion of the construction in early October.