Caught on camera on doorstep of Fortress Europe

Hi-tech surveillance and strict enforcement make the EU's border with Poland almost impregnable

Special report: European integration

John Hooper in Frankfurt an der Oder
Thursday March 15, 2001
The Guardian

In the border post on the German side of the frontier with Poland, eerie images glow from a monitor. They show people walking over the bridge across the river Oder that joins the two countries, their faces
deprived of features and replaced by bright, blank ovals.

At first sight it looks like the negative of a black-and-white video. But it is, in fact, an image shaped, not by light, but by heat, captured by a thermographic camera mounted on the roof outside the Bundes Grenz
Schutz (BGS) - frontier police - post.

Here, we are on the very ramparts of Fortress Europe.

With a flick of a joystick, the operator swivels the camera so that it can peer away from the bridge, deep into the forests on the Polish side of the Oder. Depending on weather condi tions, these thermographic
devices, originally developed to spot tanks, can "see" up to four and a half miles.

The operator plays a recording from one recent evening. He picks out on the screen a tiny, bright, white speck materialising from the edge of the river. It is a human being.

"A Russian male," says the camera operator. He is probably from Chechnya. The Polish government estimates that 80% of Russian passport holders caught trying to cross the frontier are Chechens.

No luck for this one, though. The operator of the thermographic camera alerted a BGS patrol and within a few hours the illegal entrant had been put back across the border.

Whatever problems the EU may be facing elsewhere around its borders, Fortress Europe can at least be satifsied that the most vulnerable frontier to the east is under rigorous surveillance.

Agnieszka Siarkiewicz of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees in Warsaw, calls it "close to impossible to cross".

Ulla Jelpke, a German MP, believes one reason why asylum seekers are increasingly testing the borders of France, Italy and Britain is because of Germany's success in blocking their route in from Poland.

"As the number of applications in Germany has gone down, the number of applications in the UK has gone up," she says.

But some - including church groups, refugee organisations and Ms Jelpke's party, the Party of Democratic Socialism (PDS), the only one in parliament that stands to the left of the ruling Social Democrats and
Greens - believe that such results have been won with unacceptable methods. Ironically, the PDS is the successor to the communist party that governed East Germany in the days of the Berlin Wall.

"We do not seek to minimise the deaths on the Wall, which were also the result of an inhuman policy," says Ms Jelpke. "But what is happening now is no better."

Migrants seeking to enter Germany run the risk of being savaged by unmuzzled police dogs and, if caught, the likelihood that their savings will be taken off them by the border police. In a recent, 33-month period,
according to government figures, 47 illegal entrants required medical treatment for bites inflicted by the BGS's dogs.

Chief Superintendent Eckehart Wache, the commander of the sector in which two-thirds of detected illegal crossings take place, said the dogs were used primarily for tracking on a long lead, but on occasions were
let off unmuzzled. "They know what they are allowed to do and what not, and they are not allowed to bite anyone unless they are attacked," he said.

But he acknowledgedthat each year some had to be "retrained and rechecked" following incidents which required their withdrawal from service.

Another intensely controversial practice is the levying by the BGS of what are, in effect, fines imposed without trial.

"We do not bring [captured illegal entrants] before a court to have them indicted because the major problem is to bring them out of the country, as the law allows us to do," said Chief Supt Wache. "This is more
important and it saves more money, saves more resources ... so we have almost no fines which were fixed by a court."

However, he added: "German law allows the police, or the public prosecutor, to keep the money of an alien when a fine by a court is probable."

Illegal entrants, many of whom are carrying their life's savings with them, have to hand over their possessions when caught and the "fine" is retained when their possessions are returned to them. The standard
penalty for illegal entry to Germany is 90 days' earnings. Chief Supt Wache said it was left to the BGS to estimate an illegal entrant's average daily earnings.

A document passed to the Guardian, which he confirmed was a record of possessions taken from a Russian entrant, suggests the fines are, on occasion, reckoned in an altogether more informal fashion.

The detainee had been carrying $450, which was reckoned by the BGS to be the equivalent of DM854 (?285). He was charged about ?6 each for the meals he ate while in custody and a further ?230 - a sum
which is not a multiple of the 90 days claimed to be the basis of calculation. That left the detainee with ?40 with which to get back to Russia.

"We never take everything," said Chief Supt Wache.

Hum, it seems Europe, may be quietly following the Russian lead of supplying Iran with "nuclear research technology"........

Source anonymous

* Hum, it seems Europe, may be quietly following the Russian lead of supplying Iran with "nuclear research technology"........
A bit of a reverse, - been doing it, filling the vacuum, created by the idiotic Gorbatchov "perestroic(k?)a", with the now R. sort of catching up:o))
Source very anonymous.

gorbechov [?}

pesteroika [?]

yo, igor, make yourself useful!
======
good night, K-san
2214

{+3sk}

you alright thereL'san??? I thought for a moment you asked............never mind.

:0)))

.... I never had the paperwork to do before, Delenne.......:0)

"The hijacking prompted Putin to interrupt his vacation in Siberia and set up an emergency
headquarters to deal personally with the situation, a Putin spokesman said. The Russian
intelligence service FSB was preparing a team to "liberate the plane," he said."


You're kidding me, right! - Vacation in Siberia?
Sorry, flipancy aside, Has it been confirmed that these two men with knives are Chechens and how big a team do they think it will take? What do the Saudis think?

OHAYA, KISAKO!
Morning, Mum!
0722
==
after that post, i tried to find those words on
der machine:
"Gorbachov", yes.

and...and...couldnt find that other word...-_-
i'll stick w/'pesteroika' for now.
===
Kim:
oy...dont believe i asked whatever it is you're
thinking....[?] [wink/sigh]
===
Kisako:
this week i 'discovered' a new female vocalist, to
be found [if anywhere] in the
'international/middle east' part of the music
store...
guess she's been around for a few years anyway; i
just didnt know of her...
Natacha Atlas?
===
....and i just know DMS Russia is preparing for a
festive St. Patrick's day...dont we always?
===
Best to my lady friends!
***

{+3sk}

* gorbechov [?}
pesteroika [?]
you alright thereL'san??? I thought for a moment you asked......

... for vodka;o)

* You're kidding me, right! - Vacation in Siberia?

Great place there, they say. One can walk for months in a row and doesn't a see a single human being around. Countryside and prospector-type Canadians like to point it out as one of the reasons Russians are closer to them, than the USniks.
Lots of snow unheard of here. When two years ago a "heavy" snow fell on Jerusalem all life in the city stopped - banks, shops, factories closed, buses didn't roll out (Israelis are poor snow drivers) - dazed jerusalemians were wandering about looking at it, feeling it, with disbelief, written all over the faces. Kids, of course, made most of it, - no school and kindergarten - ye-e-e-ha-a-a! Moms 'n dads of Haifa, Tel-Aviv, etc., etc., etc., gave in to the kiddie bullying (as it was all over TV, special! And they were intrigued enough themselves.) and were loadind their dear ones (and sandwiches, and coffee, and blankets, and ... grills, and steaks, and shish-kebab, and ... what-not!) into cars and minivans and transporting them to Jerusalem to see the snow "live" and not to lose a snow barbeque option. The road to Jerusalem was overloaded beyond belief, with traffic police girls in blue an yellow more interested in throwing snowballs and chasing one another, than in that abused traffic. That snow was gone by the end of that day together with moms 'n dads transporting their sleeping kids back, - who can measure the mileage of film and video-tape shot that day.

Israelis are ... well, Israelis. - A man clumsily parks his Volvo in reverse gear, holding up a honking traffic (roads are narrow and the traffic is heavy). I spot a friend of mine, Shimon (Simon - in other languages;o))) in an old Subaru directly behind that Volvo, barking at the hapless driver: "Why the hell do You need that Volvo for????!!!! Let's make an exchange!!!"
Me - What? Shimon?
Shimon - Ah-h! He can't drive it, anyways!!
The Volvo man was barking back with equal ease, and all seemed to enjoy the atmosphere. LOL.
P.S. To all interested - I don't drive. It is a "suicide" to do driving in Israel, anyways.
The intercity bus drivers are crazy, shooting their Volvos and MANs at 120+ (some 75 MPH), but the skill shows.

Kim. I wish, I knew;o) - with all this continuous period of bar mitzvas, purims, weddings (the last one was yesterday night! How many more to follow?) I am lost.

Unsolicted remark:

i've seen protestant weddings, catholic weddings...a total of 5, i think.

but, no kidding, i attended a jewish wedding around 87-88....
and it was one of the most profound ceremonies i ever saw...i got the impression "hey, i think they _mean_ it!".
i've believed this ever since, K-san.
==
at the reception, we played loud, fast punk-type music [bassist was the groom]; for two songs, ha, before the future mom-in-law made the 'cut!' slash-across-throat gesture...heh.
the 'real' reception band took our place.
==
and did they play 'hava nagila'?
oh hell yeah!

and did they play 'we've only just begun'?
lololololololololololololol


um....no. [wink]
==
K-san:

i believe i had 6 mixed drinks last year; Smirnoff 100 fortified 5 of the 6...
but when i was down in va. in november, my sister fixed me up a large pina colada, fueled by 151 proof rum.
good thing i didnt have to walk a straight line just then.....


Best of, ladies!

* Unsolicted remark:
i've seen protestant weddings, catholic weddings...a total of 5, i think.
L'-san, "my" last one was a "kill"(!), - it was a wedding of a "Jewish" (not the "Arab's" Arab) Arab and a Ukrainian!

* and it was one of the most profound ceremonies i ever saw...i got the impression "hey, i think they _mean_ it!".
i've believed this ever since, K-san.
A more-or-less "sober" start ... real "sober" hupa ... a less sober "break that glass(!)" and (was it not crazy?!) ... ... ... ;o)

* and did they play 'hava nagila'?
oh hell yeah!
V'smecha! Convert, L'-san.;o))

.....and if i do, will you dance with me?

;oP