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🇵🇱 Poland /Elections & Politics

The fate of Poles in Belarus hangs in the balance: “We are on the edge”

From Rzeczpospolita · () Polish

Translated from Polish and summarized by DistantNews. Read the original for the full story.

At a glance

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  • The article examines the situation of Belarus's Polish minority as activist Andrzej Poczobut returns after five years in a Belarusian prison and four months in Poland.
  • More than 50 regional leaders and teachers from the Union of Poles in Belarus met in Białystok.
  • Union president Andżelika Borys said members had preserved their Polish identity despite the conditions they faced.

“We did not give up. We preserved our Polish identity, our Polish identity along the Niemen,” Andżelika Borys told activists gathered in Białystok.

Borys leads the Union of Poles in Belarus, an organization that Belarusian authorities in Minsk have not recognized since 2005. The group brings together tens of thousands of people who have spent decades defending the rights of the country's several-hundred-thousand-strong Polish minority.

We did not give up. We preserved our Polish identity, our Polish identity along the Niemen.

· Andżelika BorysBorys addressed activists at the Union of Poles in Belarus meeting in Białystok.

More than 50 people came to the organization's Supreme Council meeting from different parts of Belarus. They included heads of regional branches and teachers from Polish community schools. Borys called each person by name and thanked them for “holding on in the conditions we have.”

The gathering came as Andrzej Poczobut prepared to return to Belarus after five years in a Belarusian prison and four months in Poland. The article asks what he will find on the other side of the border and describes the community as facing an uncertain and precarious situation.

holding on in the conditions we have

· Andżelika BorysBorys thanked members of the organization for continuing their work despite the circumstances.
About this summary

Originally published by Rzeczpospolita in Polish. Translated, summarized, and contextualized automatically by DistantNews, with a note on how the source frames the story. Not individually reviewed before publishing. How this works.

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