Struggling to navigate through Lebanon’s ongoing economic and financial crisis, Syrian refugees residing in the country have embarked on a number of perilous routes toward a long-awaited EU asylum. They (as well as those who have working permits throughout the country) continue to abandon Lebanon and aim for an emerging and increasingly popular migration route into Europe, via Belarus. Many Syrians leaving the country persist to put their lives and those of their families at risk. Across the last two months of 2021, reports claim that more than 16,000 undocumented migrants entered the European Union from Belarus, following a decision by Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko in response to the Brussels-imposed sanctions to no longer halt asylum-seekers from crossing into neighboring Poland. Large groups of people fleeing violence and poverty across the Middle East, including Lebanon’s Syrian refugee community, worked with human smugglers to endure perilous routes towards asylum in Europe. Research has identified ongoing processes of states using migrants and refugees as leverage in their migration diplomacy strategies for decades, and Belarus serves as the international community’s (and the EU’s) most recent example.
A Renewed Hope of Asylum: From Beirut to Belarus on a Tourist Visa
Regional and international airlines across the MENA region arranging trips to Belarus through the Beirut International Airport reportedly saw a demand surge in late 2021. Around that time, a steady stream of Syrian refugees from Lebanon turned to this new migration route into Europe, alongside thousands of asylum seekers coming from Iraq and Syria. Having not been granted resettlement via the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), and with foreign governments largely delaying asylum applications or backlogged due to COVID-19, refugees from the region boarded flights from Lebanon to Belarus, where many of the “tourists” then attempt to work with smugglers to assist them in entering neighboring countries in the EU. As the Syrian conflict persists, hundreds of thousands of Syrian refugees in Lebanon have attempted in vain for close to a decade to gain asylum abroad. Having exhausted all legal asylum and resettlement options without success, and following failed attempts to leave the country on board a smuggler boat bound for Cyprus or through the dangerous route back through Syria to Turkey and on to Greece, this new route served as an emerging and only option. Based on refugees’ testimonials, social media groups on WhatsApp and Facebook provided information on how to obtain a tourist visa to Belarus, and stay in a hotel for a few days prior to moving towards the Polish border with the help of smugglers.
Using Refugees as Political Leverage
At the peak of incoming waves into the EU at the end of 2021, the EU accused Belarus of flying in thousands of people (predominantly from the MENA region) and pushing them into the EU via Poland, Lithuania and Latvia as part of a “hybrid attack” in response to the aforementioned sanctions on President Alexander Lukashenko’s government for alleged human rights abuses. While Belarus denied those accusations, the EU has accused President Lukashenko of permitting the entry of thousands of would-be asylum seekers (mostly from Syria and Iraq) with the aim of using them as a “political weapon” in their ongoing battles with European powers to lift sanctions.
By October 2021, amid the peak of crossings, the Polish government had declared a state of national emergency and doubled the number of troops to the Belarus border. According to Amnesty International, in many cases asylum seekers who are caught and pushed back to Belarus by Polish troops, are then pushed back toward Poland by Belarusian border guards – essentially placing them in limbo in perilous conditions. The predicament at the Polish-Belarusian border has prompted comment from EU officials in Lebanon. A spokeswoman for the EU in the country insisted that the EU’s position is that Belarus is “using human beings in need to advance political goals, in violation of fundamental European values and principles,” adding, “The EU and its member states condemn the instrumentalization of migrants and refugees by the Belarusian regime.”
What Has Happened Since?
Eventually, later in 2021, trips from Lebanon to Belarus would be restricted to Lebanese citizens with visas or residency permits of Belarus, Belarusian citizens, and foreigners who have residency permits in Belarus. The European Commission Vice-President Margaritis Schinas has since urged Lebanon to contribute to the EU’s efforts to curb the smuggling of migrants from Belarus to the EU countries.
With the migration route across the border from Belarus into EU countries effectively blocked, many Syrian refugees who flew from Beirut to Minsk in late 2021 remain in legal limbo, and an increasingly life-threatening situation. Syrian refugees who left Lebanon had their passports stamped with a ban on re-entry upon their exit from the country, and with their Belarusian tourist visas now expired amid no path to asylum either in a country of the European Union or in Belarus, they are now coming to terms with the possibility of deportation to Syria – a reality that has begun for many according to reports. In an official statement on this migration predicament, UNHCR urged Lebanon to ensure that all individuals “who wish to re-enter their country of former residence and who may have a fear of return to their country of origin” are readmitted so that their protection needs can be properly assessed.
The route from Lebanon to Belarus, and the evolving migration emergency it yielded, highlights important gaps in migration governance as well as an overall manipulation of vulnerabilities for political interests. As International Refugee Law continues to develop in scope and reach, as well as in its ability to navigate emerging realities and cases of individuals in legal limbo or deadlock, it is the duty of states to bilaterally and regionally coordinate to meet some of the region’s most pivotal protection needs for those most vulnerable. Through upholding the non-refoulement principle, states across the EU and Belarus included, must uphold their duties under International Customary Law, as well as their duties towards the community they continue to leverage for political interests. For its part, the Lebanese government remains strategically indifferent towards the refugee communities within its borders, ultimately driving them to going to such lengths to survive. Revisiting legal and labor frameworks governing Syrian refugees in the country could serve as a temporary solution for the community as they await resettlement through legal channels.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Jasmin Lilian Diab (she/her) is a Canadian-Lebanese expert in Migration, Gender and Conflict Studies and she is the Director of the Institute for Migration Studies at the Lebanese American University, where she also serves as an Assistant Professor of Migration Studies at the Department of Social and Education Sciences. She serves as a Visiting Professor at the Department of Peace and Conflict Studies at the United Nations-mandated University for Peace, and Adjunct Faculty Member of International Migration and Refugee Law at the Global Institute of Law.