Polish farmers opened Ukrainian freight wagons carrying grain at the Medyka border crossing, briefly blocking the tracks on the strategically important railway line. A group of 25 farmers ran from a demonstration on a country road onto a nearby railway track, a local police spokeswoman said on Tuesday.
After negotiations with police officers, the action was ended within minutes. A small amount of grain ended up on the tracks.
Poles sing national anthem
A video from social networks circulated on Ukrainian public television showing farmers unloading corn from several freight wagons from the eastern neighboring country and singing the Polish national anthem.
“Unauthorized interference with the operation of the railway”
Ukrainian Railways confirmed the incident at the Polish border station in Medyka. The two open grain wagons were destined for Germany. In total, there are about 40 Ukrainian wagons with agricultural goods in this station. The Polish Railways and the Ukrainian Embassy in Poland were informed “about the unauthorized interference in the operation of the railway”.
Nationwide farmers’ protests
The action is part of national farmers’ protests. They are aimed against the EU’s agricultural policy, but also against the import of cheap agricultural products from Ukraine. Farmers have long been blocking border crossings to the neighboring country to the east in Dorohusk, Hrebenne, Korczowa and Medyka. On Tuesday they also blocked highways, roundabouts and intersections at 200 places.
“We farmers from all over Poland were the first to extend a hand of friendship and welcome our brothers from Ukraine. And now we are being harmed by them,” Roman Kondrow of the “The Deceived Village” initiative told radio station Rmf.fm. “Various mafia organizations bring this grain to Poland. There is no other way to say it.”
Polish farmers also complain that the EU’s Green Deal imposes new conditions on them, while allowing grain and other agricultural products from Ukraine onto the market that could be produced more cheaply without these conditions.
The Foreign Ministry in Kiev called on Warsaw to end the blockades and take action against “anti-Ukrainian rhetoric.” “There is no justification for the blockade of the Polish-Ukrainian border, whatever slogans may accompany it,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Oleh Nikolenko wrote on Facebook.
Source: Krone
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