Poland continues building electronic fence on border with Russia
Poland has installed this week two more sections of an electronic barrier on its border with the Russian enclave of Krolewiec, a Border Guard spokesperson has said.
In November 2022, Poland started building a 2.5-metre high and 3-metre deep fence on the border with the Krolewiec Oblast amid concerns that Russia might begin to channel migrants across the enclave. The construction of a 199-km electronic barrier, divided into 12 sections and comprised of cameras and motion sensors, began in April 2023.
On Thursday, Anna Michalska, spokeswoman for the Polish Border Guard, said that two more electronic sections of the fence had been installed on the Polish-Russian border.
"In total, nine out of the planned 12 sections have already been installed," she added.
Michalska also said that so far, nearly 1,600 poles for cameras and over 155 kilometres of network and transmission cables have been installed, which is 80 percent of the planned elements.
She added that a Supervision Centre at the Border Guard in Kętrzyn, northern Poland, is being organised where the signals from the cameras and sensors will be monitored.
The electronic barrier on the border with Russia is being built by the Polish company Telbud under a PLN 373-million (EUR 84-million) contract signed with the Border Guard last December. The whole system is scheduled to be completed by the end of September.
Last October, Poland also completed a 186-km barrier consisting of a five-metre steel fence topped with razor wire on its border with Belarus having experienced heightened migratory pressure from that country with thousands of migrants trying to get into the Polish territory. In June this year, an electronic barrier comprised of cameras, thermal-vision surveillance equipment and sensors was added to the Polish-Belarusian border wall.
