Lithuania's border emergency and Poland's Afghan exit, seen from 5 July 2021
Two reports from the days before 5 July 2021 showed pressure and change along the European Union's eastern flank.
What was shaping the security picture on Europe's eastern flank on 5 July 2021? Two recent developments stood out, one at the Belarusian border and one far from Europe.
On 2 July 2021, Lithuania declared a state of emergency as the number of undocumented migrants crossing from Belarus rose. The Lithuanian government accused Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko of deliberately trying to destabilise the country by encouraging and allowing people, mostly Syrians, to cross the border.
On 30 June 2021, the last Polish troops left Afghanistan, ending Poland's involvement in the war. Around 33,000 Polish troops had served there, and 44 were killed in action.
What the two reports showed
The two events were separate, and the reports did not link them. Taken together, they showed a Lithuanian government treating a migration surge as a matter of state emergency, and a neighbouring country closing a long overseas military commitment.
For Lithuania, the central question as of 5 July 2021 was how it would handle the crossings from Belarus under emergency conditions. For Poland, the Afghan chapter had formally ended.
