Poland closing Belarus border due to aggressive Russian nuclear drill, PM Tusk confirms.

Sept 2025 : Poland will seal its border with Belarus at midnight on Thursday in response to a major Russian military exercise, Prime Minister Donald Tusk has confirmed on Tuesday.

Moscow holds the Zapad exercise, a joint drill with Kremlin-allied Belarus, roughly every four years to simulate a clash with NATO countries in Eastern Europe.

Tusk said the “very aggressive” drills had prompted Warsaw’s decision to shut the border with Belarus.

“We are facing a growing number of provocations from Russia and Belarus”, he added.

The war games, running in between 12^th. to 16^th. September, will involve tens of thousands of Russian and Belarusian troops in maneuvers close to Poland and Lithuania. Some drills, poned near the Belarusian village of Gozha and in the Russian exclave Kaliningrad’s Dobrovolsk would be exercised just a dozen of kilometers away from the NATO countries’ borders.

Russian and Belarusian troops will also practice planning to use Oreshnik nuclear-capable missile systems.

Tusk said a key “target” of the drills is the Suwałki Gap, the NATO-controlled, 70-kilometres choke point separating Belarus and Kaliningrad that Russia would need to take over in the event of an all-out war.

It is not the first time Poland has clamped down on its border with Belarus. Warsaw has shut border checkpoints in recent years amid mounting tensions with Minsk and last year suspended access to asylum for migrants crossing into the country via Belarus, accusing the country of orchestrating a crisis on the Polish border as a form of hybrid warfare.

This new law of Poland is considered to be controversial, despite being backed by European Union leaders, to suspend access to asylum for new arrivals crossing into the country through Belarus after accusing Moscow of weaponising migration flows to upend security in the region.

The measure was cleared by Poland’s parliament and was signed by President Andrzej Duda, Prime Minister Donald Tusk. “Every day of delay puts our border guards, soldiers and police officers at further risk by prolonging this acute crisis at the border. Thanks to this tough policy, we’re effectively stopping the wave”, this is what Prime Minister Tusk had voiced before the Law was enforced.

Earlier, critics and rights groups had criticised the plan, calling it “unlawful” and warning that implementing “abusive pushbacks” violates both EU and international refugee law. A report published this week accused Polish and Belarusian forces of systematically abusing migrants trapped in the Białowieża Forest. The report detailed beatings, dog attacks and forced returns by Polish guards, as well as torture and rape by Belarusian forces.

Pushbacks, the practice of summarily expelling people without allowing them to apply for asylum have also been condemned by the U.N. refugee agency as unlawful. The asylum suspension is the latest chapter in Poland’s hardening migration policy

Team Maverick…