Fears in Poland’s east as Wagner mercenaries train across the border

KOLPIN-OGRODNIKI, Poland – People living near Poland’s border with Belarus said on Thursday that they could hear shooting and helicopters after

Russia’s Wagner Group arrived to train Belarusian special forces

just a few miles from the frontier, compounding their fears that the Ukraine war would reach them.

Mrs Agata Moroz, the 56-year-old village mayor of Kolpin-Ogrodniki, could not stop her tears as she expressed her anxiety for her family.

“I’m afraid. I have a son in the army. He’s a military man. I’m worried about him, I have grandchildren. I have a disabled husband. I’m most worried about them,” Mrs Moroz said.

“Everyone says that something will happen, that something will definitely happen,” she added.

Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin was shown in a video on Wednesday welcoming his fighters to Russian ally Belarus, telling them they would take no further part in the Ukraine war for now but ordering them to gather their strength for Africa while they trained the Belarusian army.

Minsk posted pictures of masked Wagner instructors, their faces covered in accordance with the mercenary group’s rules, training Belarusian soldiers with armoured vehicles and what appear to be drone controls.

It is unclear how many fighters of the Russian mercenary group are now at the training ground of the 38th airborne assault brigade outside the Belarusian city of Brest.

“We can hear helicopters flying there. When they do, all the windows are shaking,” said Mr Adam Ligor, a 45-year-old farmer and Mrs Moroz’s neighbour.

Sounds of shooting could be heard as he stood in the yard of his farm, surrounded by cornfields, sunflowers and patches of forest, some 500m from the border with Belarus.

Poland, a former Warsaw Pact member which has been a full member of the US-led Nato military alliance since 1999, began

moving more than 1,000 troops to the east of the country

earlier in July amid rising concern that Wagner fighters in Belarus could lead to increased tension on its border.

On Thursday, the Polish Defence Ministry said in an e-mailed statement that it was monitoring the situation on the border with Belarus and is prepared for various scenarios.

“No military columns were seen in Brest, which means that there are probably up to a few dozen of them (Wagner fighters). They probably brought them on a helicopter,” Mr Anton Motolko, founder of the Belarusian Hajun project, an opposition group which monitors military activity in the country, told Reuters.

In December 2022, Russia and Belarus signed an agreement legalising the permanent presence of Russian military formations on Belarus territory. Earlier this week, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko signed a law establishing combat centres for the joint training of military personnel of both countries.

Wagner’s move to Belarus was part of a deal that ended the group’s mutiny attempt in June – when it took control of a Russian military headquarters, marched on Moscow and threatened to tip Russia into civil war – President Vladimir Putin said. REUTERS