It is impossible to predict when Poland will be able to restore visa-free local border traffic with Russia’s neighbouring Kaliningrad exclave, Polish deputy Interior Minister Jarosław Zieliński has said.

Temporary checks at all road, sea and air borders with EU countries were introduced in early July ahead of the NATO summit in Warsaw and the World Youth Day in the south of the country.

Deputy Minister Zieliński said that security-related issues which led to the local border traffic to be suspended with the Kaliningrad oblast have not stopped.

During a press conference on Wednesday, Zieliński did not specify as to the kinds of threats.

Asked by journalists whether these threats existed before this traffic was temporarily suspended in July, the deputy minister said: “The world is changing and circumstances are changing as well”.

Similar border traffic with Ukraine was reinstated on Wednesday.

According to migrant.info.pl, a website run by the interior ministry, “Local border traffic is a form of facilitating crossing borders for citizens of two neighbouring states living in a frontier area. Under the local border traffic [programme], residents of border areas may regularly cross a common state border without a visa, in order to stay in the border area of the second state. Such trips can be for social, cultural or family reasons [...].”

(rg)