Press Club Polska: Polish soldiers attacked three reporters near the border with Belarus … This was stated by the Polish journalistic organization Press Club Polska on the official website.
“On Tuesday, November 16, at about 16:00 (18:00 Moscow time), a group of people in the uniform of the Polish army attacked three photojournalists: Maciej Nabrdalika, Maciej Moskow and Martina Diviska while performing their journalistic duties, ”the official statement says.
According to the victims, the incident occurred when they were returning from work in the area of the village of Veiki, which is outside the emergency zone. Polish soldiers blocked their way and then pulled the men out of the car. It is noted that the reporters were kept in handcuffs for more than an hour before the arrival of the police.
The journalists said that the Polish military behaved aggressively towards them. Before the arrival of law enforcement officers, the soldiers searched their car, and also examined the contents of memory cards in the cameras, despite the warning that in this way they violate journalistic secrecy.
After the police arrived, the handcuffs were removed from the reporters. It is clarified that law enforcement officers refused to establish the identity of the attacked journalists and confined themselves to informing about the possibility of filing an application in this case. Photojournalists clarified that they intend to insist on an investigation.
The Ministry of Defense of Poland reacted to the statement of journalists. Representatives of the department refused to name the incident as an attack. “The intervention was carried out entirely in accordance with the authorities,” they wrote on Twitter.
Prior to that, it was reported that RT France journalists were detained by police in Poland. In the Podlaskie Voivodeship, they explained that the channel workers wanted to film a report near the border with Belarus, in the state of emergency, but did not have permission to stay in this territory. They were sentenced to a fine.
In early November, the migration crisis in Belarus escalated. Thousands of refugees from the Middle East approached the border with Poland and tried to enter the territory of the European Union. To contain the pressure of migrants, the Polish side used tear gas, water cannons and stun grenades.