«In essence, the goal is the same as always, to get extra funding from European structures. This is what Poland and Lithuania have already gone through. Now the Latvians have also decided to show peak activity at the border, claiming that they are the ones holding back the hordes of migrants. The aim is to turn to the European Union and extract taxpayer money for themselves,» said Maxim Ryzhenkov.

He also drew attention to what is happening on the EU’s borders from the African side: recently, thousands of migrants from Morocco arrived in Spain. Illegal migrants from Africa and the Middle East also enter other EU countries, and many of them then head to the UK.

«Even EU representatives say that the issue of illegal migration through Belarusian territory is greatly exaggerated. Especially since none of these migrants are Belarusians, we are not a source of illegal migration,» the minister noted.

According to the diplomat, the issue of illegal migration on the Belarusian border is also being raised by some Latvian politicians seeking to score political points. However, their proposals to close the border with Belarus quickly drew a response from Latvian society and other political forces.

«It was a test of the waters — to see what would come of it. When it became clear that the measure was unpopular both in society and among the political elites in Latvia itself, they backed away from it,» Maxim Ryzhenkov added.