Afghan asylum seekers awarded compensation for mistreatment by Polish border guards

Two Afghan asylum seekers who irregularly crossed the border from Belarus into Poland have each been awarded 5,000 zlotys (€1,177) compensation for their mistreatment by Polish border guards.

The decision relates to an incident in August 2021, shortly after the start of a migration crisis on the border , where Belarus has helped and encouraged tens of thousands of people, mainly from Africa and Asia, to cross irregularly.

The two Afghans encountered a Polish border guard patrol after crossing from Belarus and requested refugee status, reports the Gazeta Wyborcza daily. They were initially taken to a border guard station but then driven back towards the border at night and left in a marshy area in Białowieża Forest.

After the asylum seekers managed to get a message to activists the next morning, a search party that included representatives of two NGOs, a member of parliament, Franciszek Sterczewski, and a Gazeta Wyborcza photojournalist spent hours trying to find them.

Eventually, they succeeded and notified the border guard, who then allowed the Afghans to launch asylum proceedings. Both now reside outside Poland, one in Germany and one in the UK.

In 2022, a court in the town of Hajnówka found the border guards' actions during the detention of the Afghans were “unjustified and illegal” because their asylum applications were not initially accepted, reports the Rzeczpospolita daily.

That led the pair to launch compensation proceedings in 2023, with each claiming PLN 80,000 for their mistreatment. Prosecutors involved in the case argued that the level of compensation should be lower, while the border guard claimed that nothing should be awarded at all.

On Thursday, the district court in Białystok granted the pair 5,000 zlotys each. Judge Anna Wiesława Hordyńska expressed full agreement with the reasons for the court in Hajnówka, which found the detention to be unjustified, reports the Polish Press Agency (PAP). Her ruling can still be appealed.

In 2022, two Polish court rulings found that the border guard's policy of “pushing back” migrants into Belarus had in some cases been illegal. Last year, a similar ruling was issued .

Poland's government has recently effectively formalized pushbacks by introducing a ban on asylum claims by people crossing the border irregularly from Belarus, who are now sent back without their applications being accepted.

The measure has been criticized by human rights groups – including the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and Poland's own human rights commissioner – as a violation of international law and Poland's constitution.

Main image credit: Agnieszka Sadowska / Agencja Wyborcza.pl