Poland hopes the chaos that engulfed Russia when mercenary leader Yevgeny Prigozhin and his band of fighters threatened Moscow on June 23 will help Ukraine in the war with its giant neighbour – but many are worried about what happens next.
After the astonishing events at the weekend, which saw Prigozhin and his Wagner group make a U-turn over their threat and relocate to Belarus, Poles now fear the outcome could destabilise that country and spur yet another migration crisis on Poland’s borders.
The official line coming from Poland’s head of state is ‘steady as she goes’. According to the Polish President, Andrzej Duda Duda, the situation regarding Russia and Prigozhin has had no effect on Poland and is merely an internal matter for the Kremlin to deal with.
However, Poland’s Prime Minister, Mateusz Morawiecki, told reporters he feared the mercenaries’ relocation will lead to increased friction on Poland’s border with Belarus.
“Tensions can be mounting at the border with Belarus as the role of Belarusian President, Alexander Lukashenko, in the recent developments in Russia is not clear,” he said. On June 25, Morawiecki visited the border with Belarus to draw attention to the situation.
Poland has battled a Belarusian-driven campaign of encouraging illegal migrants to cross the Polish border. Last year it had to contend with millions of war refugees pouring into the country across Poland’s border with Ukraine.
Poles are concerned that any destabilisation in Belarus caused by an active participation in the war in Ukraine, or a possible annexation by Russia, could lead to yet another major refugee crisis, this time on the Belarusian border.
Media outlets in Poland have tended to portray the crisis sparked by Prigozhin as a major humiliation for Russian President, Vladimir Putin, and a sign that his power is waning. Chief editor of portal Onet.pl wrote that Russia “looked like a banana republic” after the weekend’s events, which he said were reminiscent of coups in Africa that saw dictators negotiate with warlords after fighting erupted, with neighbouring states getting caught up in the fall-out.
But some believe there could be more to Prigozhin’s actions than meets the eye. General Leon Komornicki, a former deputy chief of staff, told Polish public radio that the attempted coup was probably a “put-up job” that actually serves Putin’s best interests. He believes the mercenary group could now be used as leverage against Lukashenko in Belarus, a country Putin is keen to involve far more in the war in Ukraine.
Putin’s only objective, argues the general, is to hold on to power and win the war in Ukraine. Prigozhin is “a creation of Russian security, a convict who owes everything he has to the Kremlin”, he said.
Some commentators in Poland said the events in Russia at the weekend were reminiscent of the so-called ‘Yanayev putsch’ in 1991 that led to the collapse of the USSR.
Also known as the August Coup, the putsch was a failed attempt by hardliners of the Russian Communist Party to forcibly gain control of the country from Mikhail Gorbachev, which some say was a provocation staged by KGB officers to help Boris Yeltsin seize power.
What followed was a decade of chaos as the KGB, the military and other players struggled for control, a struggle that was only resolved when Putin came to power with the backing of the security services in 2000.
