Belarus could stop the transit of gas from Russia to the European Union

On Thursday, the unrecognized Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko announced his country's strong response to any sanctions imposed in response to the migration crisis on Belarus's border with Poland, which is also part of the EU's eastern border. The AFP agency informed about it. "If additional sanctions are imposed on us ... we must respond," Lukashenko said in a statement released by the state news agency Belta, suggesting that Belarus could stop the transit of gas from Russia to the European Union via the Yamal-Europa pipeline. "We are heating Europe and still threatening to close the borders. And if we turn off the natural gas there?" threatened Lukashenko, recalling the fact that Russia's Yamal-Europe pipeline is crossing into Poland via Belarus. Moscow's Echo radio station quoted Lukashenko as saying that he had asked Russian President Vladimir Putin to join Russia's Defense Ministry in protecting Russia's and Belarus's borders. Lukashenko explained that in the border area with Poland, for the past two days, researched a "dangerous trend" when "they tried to transfer weapons and ammunition to the refugee camp." Lukashenko claims that the weapons were imported from Ukraine and that this is a "provocation". Polish Foreign Ministry spokesman Lukasz Jasina said in an echo of Moscow on Thursday that migrants on the Polish-Belarusian border were still behaving calmly, but that their numbers were growing. Jasina added that Poland offered a humanitarian convoy for migrants to Belarus, but did not receive consent. Lukashenko said on Thursday that there were many children and pregnant women among the refugees at the border, adding that they should be provided with the necessary assistance. "There are (there) a lot of women who are in their eighth or ninth month of pregnancy," he said. "When they have an appointment, of course, we'll take them to the hospital and take care of them," he said.