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November 19, 2021

Belarus Shelters Some Asylum-Seekers on Polish Border, Deports Iraqi Refugees
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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 E.U. 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 till 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."



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