Belarus on Thursday opened a heated warehouse to hundreds of asylum seekers who spent weeks enduring winter weather and squalid conditions in tent encampments along the Polish border. European Union countries have accused Belarus of tricking migrants into massing at the border in retaliation for EU sanctions. Belarus, meanwhile, accused its neighbors of brutality. Video distributed by Belarus shows Lithuanian border guards kicking an Iraqi asylum seeker in a sleeping bag and siccing a dog on him. Elsewhere, three photojournalists covering the crisis say Polish border guards verbally abused and handcuffed them while authorities searched their equipment.
Meanwhile, over 400 Iraqi asylum seekers were deported from Minsk on Thursday. This is Mohsen Addi, a member of Iraq’s persecuted Yazidi community, speaking after arriving at an airport in Iraqi Kurdistan.
Mohsen Addi: “I would have stayed 'til death, but my family was in danger. If the situation doesn't improve in Iraq in a year or two, I’ll leave again. If there is no solution, I’ll be forced to leave.”