Lithuania on Thursday sent five Afghan migrants back to Belarus shortly after they had crossed the border despite the European Court of Human Rights earlier saying they should be allowed to stay. Lithuania has been pushing back migrants since early August and only a few dozen have been allowed in.
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More than 4,100 migrants from the Middle East and South Asia have entered Lithuania this year, and the European Union has accused Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko of sending them over its borders with EU nations in retaliation for sanctions imposed by the bloc on the Minsk government.
Interior Minister Agne Bilotaite told Reuters she saw the case as "an obvious attempt to open a new route for illegal migration, by manipulating the Afghanistan events".
In 2016, following its intervention in the Syria war, Western states accused Russia of deliberately encouraging migrants to flood into Europe, fueling the rise of the far-Right and challenging the European Union. If Belarus believes it can do the same to its immediate neighbors it blames for political discontent at home, it is likely to keep doing so.
