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Poland to install surveillance cameras along entire eastern border: officials

31.10.2022 17:00
Poland is set to install surveillance cameras and motion detectors along its entire eastern border, including a EUR 75 million electronic barrier on the Russian border, due to international security threats, according to media reports.
Poland is set to install surveillance cameras and motion detectors along its entire eastern border in response to international security threats, according to reports on Monday.
Poland is set to install surveillance cameras and motion detectors along its entire eastern border in response to international security threats, according to reports on Monday. Twitter/Polish Border Guard

The news of the plan was reported by Poland’s Rzeczpospolita newspaper on Monday. 

Poland wants to set up a PLN 354 million (EUR 75.2 million) electronic protection system on its border with Russia's exclave of Kaliningrad, the paper said. 

The system will extend along the entire length of the 200-kilometre frontier, with the Polish Border Guard agency already working to select the contractor for the project, Rzeczpospolita added. 

Under the plan, the electronic border-protection system is due for kick-off by the end of September 2023, "although we hope to be able to launch it earlier,” said the Polish Border Guard’s spokeswoman Anna Michalska. 

Seismic sensors and night-vision cameras    

According to Rzeczpospolita, the border will be fitted with various electronic safeguards, such as a system of detectors, including seismic sensors and night-vision cameras to verify incoming signals.

Special algorithms will be used to distinguish between the sound of human footsteps, for instance, and the microseisms created by wild animals, officials said.

The surveillance footage will be recorded and stored in the system, reporters were told.

Such an electronic security system was first installed several years ago on Poland’s border with Ukraine to monitor the area around the Hrebenne border crossing, which had seen the biggest influx of illegal migration and smuggling in previous years, Rzeczpospolita reported. 

The installation of electronic safeguards on the border with Russia is set to start immediately after a similar electronic barrier is fitted along the frontier with Belarus, which is expected to happen within two weeks, officials told the newspaper.

Polish Deputy Interior Minister Maciej Wąsik told lawmakers last week that the government had been planning to build an electronic barrier on the Russian border "for a long time, due to the international situation.”

He added, as cited by Rzeczpospolita: “Additionally there have been media reports about Russia opening its skies to aircraft from Syria, among other countries, which can land at Kaliningrad Airport. As of today we see no threat, but we are monitoring the situation closely. We have to be one step ahead."

Monday is day 250 of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. 

(pm/gs)

Source: PAP, rp.pl