| Abstract [eng] |
In the summer of 2021, the Belarusian authorities started operations aimed at the Eastern countries of the European Union (EU). When thousands of migrants, mainly from the Middle East and North Africa, were transferred through Belarus to Lithuania, Latvia, and Poland, the borders between Belarus and these three countries became a front line. This final master's thesis is devoted to analyzing the case of migration instrumentalized by the Belarusian regime. It sent migrants to neighbor countries, including Lithuania, and their presence at the border was aimed to exert political and reputational pressure. This work aims to find out how instrumentalized migration is used for influence operations, specifically in the case of Belarus-Lithuania and based on the concept of hybrid threats, to reveal the areas affected by instrumentalized migration in Lithuania and to provide insights aimed at improving the state's ability to deal with instrumentalized migration as a hybrid threat. To achieve the aim, first of all, the theoretical part is presented, which is dedicated to the conceptualization of hybrid threats as a concept, and also great attention is paid to the issue of hybrid threats and the ongoing debate in the scientific field. Academics have discussed hybrid threats for a long time, and after the annexation of Crimea in 2014, it has become one of the main objects of debate in the international relations discipline. Although there is a consensus that the challenges posed by hybrid threats are one of the most important issues on the security agenda, there is still a debate about what and why we are considering hybrid threats, and what crosses this line and falls into the category of hybrid warfare. In 2021 after the flow of migrants trying to get from Belarus to Lithuania increased in June, various measures were soon taken to control the unprecedented situation in the country - a state of emergency was introduced, numerous state border guard services, public security services, police, and military forces were deployed at the border. In August of 2021, the pushback of migrants trying to cross the border illegally from Belarus began, and the installation of a physical barrier began too. From the very beginning, the situation was taken seriously, and with the help of various measures, EU assistance, and the adoption of changes in Lithuanian legislation, migration flows were largely controlled, however, the crisis highlighted the country's vulnerabilities. To find out which areas of Lithuania were most affected by the migration crisis, in the practical part of this work, a qualitative analysis of sources was performed and the summarized results of the study were presented. The study results show that the migration crisis, which started in the summer of 2021, affected five areas in Lithuania; three experienced the primary impact of the crisis, and two experienced the secondary impact. The main goal of instrumentalized migration by the Belarusian regime was to discredit the liberal democratic order. The legal field was the most affected when Lithuania faced a huge flow of illegal migration. It is worth noting that the impact of the crisis is still felt in this area. Belarus targeted the Eastern EU states by taking advantage of their obligations under international law. By targeting the promoted humanitarian values, an attempt was made to create a humanitarian crisis by portraying states, including Lithuania, as not fulfilling their obligations to human rights. |
