Osnabrück/Berlin, March 27, 2025 - Terre des Hommes Germany strongly criticizes the signing of the law temporarily suspending the right of asylum in Poland. "Since 2021, the Lukashenko regime, supported by the Kremlin, has been deliberately issuing visas to people on the run and exploiting their desperation to exert pressure on the EU. By suspending the right of asylum, however, the Polish government is not targeting the aggressors, but only the refugees. In practice, the Polish government's plans will lead to the separation of families on the run and the deportation of unaccompanied children," said Teresa Wilmes, Terre des Hommes representative for refugees and migration.
The law initially proposes to deprive those seeking protection of the opportunity to apply for asylum in Poland for 60 days. This is intended to legitimize and expand the existing practice of brutal, illegal pushbacks at the Polish-Belarusian border. "Even if unaccompanied minors are theoretically exempt from the suspension, children and young people in particular are often not recognized as such by the Polish authorities. And children who enter the country with their families will, in most cases, be pushed back to Belarus without any examination of their application for protection," Wilmes continued.
The future German government must also urgently reconsider its course on this issue. During the coalition negotiations, the CDU proposed no longer examining asylum applications in Germany from people who were "instrumentalized as illegal migrants for Putin's hybrid warfare against Europe." "That sends exactly the wrong signal: children must pay the price through no fault of their own. Systematically weakening human rights cannot be the right response to regimes that violate human rights," explains Teresa Wilmes.
The humanitarian crisis on the Polish-Belarusian border has existed since 2021. Children, young people, and adults are forced to endure days and weeks in the forest and, in some cases, experience massive violence from the Polish authorities during unlawful pushbacks. Terre des Hommes has been working with Polish civil society organizations to ensure the supply of food, dry clothing, and medicine to refugee children and young people in the border region.
Terre des Hommes on the suspension of asylum law in Poland
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Children on the run