Polish Border Wall Threatens Podlasie Tatars' Future

The interior of the Kruszyniany mosque, located in one of Poland’s two Tatar villages. Its caretaker, Dzemil Gembicki, welcomes visitors eager to learn the story of a people who have lived in Poland for six centuries.

Dzenneta Bogdanowicz never imagined she would witness the construction of a wall in the middle of nowhere, just two kilometres from her front door.

“It’s right there, so close. And of course, it’s bad for business,” the 60-year-old Polish hotelier tells IPS outside the wooden guesthouse and restaurant she runs in Kruszyniany. It’s a village of 200 inhabitants 250 kilometres northeast of Warsaw, in the Podlasie region.

Under the shadow of what some call a new Iron Curtain, the Tatars of Podlasie face isolation and economic decline. Tourism has slowed to a trickle. Census data shows the population shrinking.

Although it’s known as the “Polish Amazonia” for its wetlands and lush vegetation, Podlasie’s border with Belarus places it at the heart of Europe’s major geopolitical fault line.

In August 2021, Belarus began channelling a flow of migrants — mostly from the Middle East and North Africa — toward the borders of Poland, Latvia, and Lithuania.

For months, Minsk expedited the issuance of short-term visas. Many migrants flew to Minsk after paying between $3,000 and $6,000 to intermediaries who promised them entry into the European Union.

From there, they were escorted to the Polish border, where, according to reports, Belarusian soldiers helped some climb the fence between the two countries.

The EU and independent observers described it as part of a “hybrid war” aimed at destabilising neighbouring countries, in retaliation for sanctions imposed after Belarus’s controversial 2020 elections. Aleksandr Lukashenko was re-elected — as happened in January 2025 — having held the presidency since 1994.

In response, Warsaw started erecting a six-metre-high steel barrier along its 400 km border with Belarus. So far, more than 200 kilometres of physical and technological barriers have already been deployed.

The heavily forested region was declared a restricted zone. Non-residents were barred, and Bogdanowicz, like most in Kruszyniany, was unable to work for 10 months.

The government insists the wall has helped curb illegal border crossings. However, authorities cite one border guard killed and 13 injured — allegedly by migrants — between 2021 and early 2025.

But humanitarian groups tell a darker story.

According to NGOs, at least 87 people have died in the region since 2021, and more than 300 are missing.

The ongoing instability has taken a toll on the tourism sector, one that many locals rely on for their livelihoods. For Bogdanowicz, however, it’s about far more than just economics.

The wooden complex she built with her husband nearly two decades ago offers more than rooms and meals. It also houses a cultural centre and a small museum, home to centuries-old Qurans, traditional garments sewn by great-great-grandmothers, and ancestral farming tools.

“It was never about money for us. We are Lipka Tatars, and this is the heart of our community in Poland,” she says.

The Tatars settled in the region in the 14th century, rewarded with land and noble titles after fighting alongside the Polish army. By the 17th century, they had established themselves in Podlasie.

“Lipka” comes from the old name for Lithuania in the language of the Crimean Tatars, with whom this predominantly Muslim community shares a common ancestry.

Today, the wooden mosque in Kruszyniany — built by Jewish architects 200 years ago — still stands as a rare symbol of Europe’s oldest practising Muslim communities.

But that legacy now hangs in the balance.

Under the shadow of what some call a new Iron Curtain, the Tatars of Podlasie face isolation and economic decline. Tourism has slowed to a trickle. Census data shows the population shrinking.

“There used to be about 5,000 Tatars in Poland,” Bogdanowicz says. “But by the last census in 2011, we were down to fewer than 2,000. The fear, the restrictions, the curfews and lockdowns… It’s taken a huge toll.”

Tension and Confusion
A 2024 report by Human Rights Watch documented what it described as “a consistent pattern of abuse” by Polish border officials, including unlawful pushbacks, beatings with batons, pepper spray use, and destruction of migrants’ phones.

Some were reportedly detained several kilometres inside Poland, then forced back into Belarus without due process. Human rights commissioners in both Poland and the EU have raised concerns about the wall’s impact on press freedom and humanitarian access.

Environmentalists, too, warn of irreversible damage to fragile ecosystems like the UNESCO-listed Białowieża Forest.

“What’s happening in Podlasie stems from extremely ineffective and unethical ways of handling migration,” said Anna Alboth, speaking to IPS by phone from Warsaw.

Alboth is a journalist and researcher with the Minority Rights Group, a UK organisation that works with ethnic and religious minorities.

“The Tatars have developed and preserved their own cultural and religious traditions. They even served as a military caste for centuries, a legacy that remains evident to this day. Many still serve in the army or as border guards,” Alboth explained.

However, the researcher also pointed to a “particularly vulnerable community” due to their small numbers. “It’s important the Tatars remain concentrated in their territory to preserve their identity, but that’s becoming increasingly difficult,” she warned.

In response to questions forwarded by IPS, Poland’s Ministry of the Interior and Administration stressed the need to “protect national security against the instrumental use of migration by the Russian and Belarusian regimes.”

Warsaw described it as “part of a strategy aimed at destabilising internal affairs in neighbouring countries and the European Union as a whole.”

Regarding the Human Rights Watch report documenting serious human rights violations by Polish border guards, the ministry stated that the NGO’s investigators were “unable to independently verify the cases described.”

Officials declined to comment on concerns related to depopulation caused by the crisis and the risks to the future of the Tatar community.

With national authorities staying quiet, Podlasie’s regional government stepped in last April with a local voucher scheme, offering 400 zlotys (around $105) to encourage tourism in the area’s lodgings and guesthouses.

But for some, the gesture feels too little, too late.

A Shared Graveyard
The road from Kruszyniany to the Tatar village of Bohoniki winds through secondary routes and marshland. Many turn-offs eastwards now end abruptly against the steel wall.

Even determining whether you’ve entered the exclusion zone is difficult. There are a few signs, but frequent patrols.

In Bohoniki, the red wooden mosque with its single black dome is still easy to spot. But visitors are scarce. “Outside summer, hardly anyone comes anymore,” blurts Miroslava Lisoszuka, a local farmer who guides the few tourists that trickle in.

She blames the confusion over border restrictions and lingering fear from the fatal attack on a border guard in 2024.

The crisis has even reached Bohoniki’s cemetery. Enclosed by stone walls for over 200 years, the two-hectare site on the village outskirts is the largest Muslim burial ground in Poland.

At the farthest edge are ten simple graves. Among them lie a baby, an unidentified adult, and other migrants who perished in the forests. From time to time, a local farmer or a border guard stumbles upon human remains in the mud.