Latvia has become Lukashenko’s new leverage over the EU
The crisis erupted in 2021 after Lukashenko threatened to flood neighboring countries with migrants and drugs; Lithuania became the first target.
Minsk redirected migrant flows toward the Latvian border, forcing Riga to seek support from its neighbors. Lithuania is considering temporarily tightening controls to curb secondary migration from Latvia.
Latvia has become the new target of what EU governments describe as Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko’s campaign to use migration as a tool of political pressure on the union’s eastern border.
After several years in which Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland shared the bulk of illegal border crossings from Belarus, Latvian authorities say the main pressure is now falling on their side. The increase in attempted crossings has been recorded just months before Latvia’s parliamentary elections scheduled for October 3, raising concerns that Minsk is once again attempting to use migration to destabilize the region.
On July 16, Latvia, whose border with Belarus stretches for 173 kilometers, recorded 111 illegal crossing attempts in a single day. Lithuania, which has a border four times longer at 679 kilometers, reported two attempts on the same day, while Poland recorded none the day before. Secondary migration to Lithuania via Latvia also quadrupled.
“Today, the Latvian border has become the main target,” said Latvian Interior Minister Jānis Dombrava.
Officials in Riga claim the timing is no coincidence. “Russia’s ongoing war against Ukraine, openly supported by the Belarusian regime, has significantly increased security risks in the region and gives Belarus additional motivation to continue its hybrid actions, including the use of migration as a tool of pressure,” said a representative of the Latvian Ministry of the Interior.
The ministry believes that Minsk is deliberately directing migration flows toward the EU’s external borders to stretch national resources and increase pressure on neighboring countries.
The crisis first erupted in 2021 after Lukashenko threatened to “flood” neighboring states with migrants and drugs. In response, Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland erected border barriers, expanded surveillance systems, and increased the number of patrols. Latvian officials now admit that these measures are no longer sufficient to cope with the mounting pressure.
“The State Border Service is doing everything possible,” said Dombrava. “However, given the intensity of migration pressure, the current resources are not always sufficient to intercept every group of illegal migrants in a timely manner.” As pressure mounts, Latvia has turned to neighboring countries for support.
Lithuania Considers Border Controls
Lithuania has sent nine border guards and two sniffer dogs to Latvia to strengthen patrols along the border with Belarus. The group replaces nine Lithuanian officers who had been stationed there since July 1.
Estonia sent two 12-member Border Guard teams to Latvia in June.
“The Latvian-Belarusian border is simultaneously the external border of NATO and the European Union, and therefore also our border,” Veiko Kommusaar, head of the Border Guard at the Estonian Police and Border Guard Board, said in an interview with Euronews.
According to Dombrava, the countries are working with the goal that “not a single illegal border intruder should be able to cross the EU’s external border.”
In practice, this has not yet been achieved. Lithuanian border authorities report that secondary migration from Latvia has also increased sharply: the number of migrants attempting to continue west through Lithuania after entering the EU via Latvia has more than quadrupled compared to the first half of 2025.
This increase has sparked discussion in Lithuania about whether to temporarily reinstate controls on the border with Latvia, following the example of Poland, which has been screening travelers arriving from Lithuania and Germany for a year now.
Lithuania’s new Interior Minister, Martynas Katelinas, did not rule out such a measure “if there are no other ways to manage the flow and stop migrants at the border,” he said.
For now, Dombrava said the priority remains strengthening the EU’s external border, not restricting movement within the union, according to his press release following the signing of an agreement between the two countries on deepening law enforcement cooperation on Thursday. “At the moment, the question of restoring border control on the Latvian-Lithuanian border is not on the table,” he noted. “Rather, it’s about the possibility of sending a significant number of border guards to each other to support the country currently under the greatest pressure.”
Migration as a Geopolitical Instrument
Officials from the three Baltic states insist that migrants are being used as a tool in a state-led operation, not as independent actors.
“What’s happening on the Latvian-Belarusian border is a deliberately planned operation, organized with the support of Belarus, the goal of which is to undermine border security and the general sense of security,” Kommusaar said.
“Ordinary people are being used as a means of pressure to achieve this goal.”
According to the Latvian Ministry of Internal Affairs, many migrants arrive in Belarus legally, after which they are taken to the border with Latvia, Lithuania, or Poland and sent to crossing points. The authorities claim that Belarusian security forces escort migrants to the border, provide equipment to breach the barriers, and in some cases prevent them from returning deeper into Belarus.
The composition of the migrants has changed over time, Lina Laurinaityte, a representative of the Lithuanian State Border Guard Service, told Euronews in a written comment. Earlier waves included citizens of Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan, Iran, Yemen, Somalia, Cameroon, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
“This is not spontaneous migration,” Laurinaityte emphasized. “This is a state-organized operation designed to exert political pressure on the European Union.”
Source: https://ru.euronews.com/my-europe/2026/07/17/latvia-becomes-lukashenkos-latest-pressur