This year about 120 000 Ukrainian citizens have passed through Latvia’s eastern border. On some days the number of Ukrainian border-crossers reached 1 300, reported the Chief of Latvian State Border Guard Guntis Pujāts in an interview to TV3 this morning, 5 August.
According to him, the flow of Ukrainians over the Latvian border has become so large because Latvia is probably the safest way for them to travel from their country or Russia to Europe or western portions of Ukraine.
In most cases these people are in transit. A rare few remain to stay in Latvia, said the head of the State Border Guard.
The second largest group of border-crossers in Latvia are people from Moldova unable to reach their home country from Russia. A total of 36 000 residents of Moldova have crossed Latvia’s eastern border so far this year.
Latvian citizens are also very active on the Latvian-Russian and Latvian-Belarusian border despite the government and authorities trying to dissuade people from traveling to those countries due to security risks.
The movement of Russian citizens over the border is higher than it was during Covid-19 pandemic but also much lower than before it.
For example, about 30 000 Russian tourists visited Latvia in 2018 and only 8 000 this year so far.
Pujāts admitted that the State Border Guard together with the State Security Service to interview arrivals.
If the people who wish to cross the border are found to support Russia’s aggressive policy, they are not allowed to enter the country.
In some cases travellers are asked to sign a document that states they do not agree with Russia’s aggressive policy.
Since the start of the war about 60 people have been turned around on the border so far.
According to Pujāts, interviews are taken randomly based on risk analysis.
The flow of illegal migrants from Belarus has reduced in Latvia’s direction. It generally looks like the regime in the neighbouring country is intentionally diverting the flow to Lithuania.
Pujāts reports that just recently Latvian Border Guards have deterred 20 people from illegally entering Latvia.