Did thousands of migrants flee to the Belarusian-Polish border on May 3rd, 2023? No, that's not true: The video dates back to 2021 and was filmed at the Bruzgi-Kuznica Belarusian-Polish border checkpoint, where refugees made their way to a refugee camp. The refugee camp at Bruzgi was shut down in March 2022.
The story appeared in a video (archived here) where it was published by berwlug on May 3rd, 2023 with hashtags #bruzgi #refugees# #refugee #refugeesingermany. The caption read:
This is how it began this afternoon. More than a thousand refugees on their way to Bruzgi border checkpoint
This is what the post looked like on TikTok at the time of writing:
(Source: TikTok screenshot taken on Mon May 8 10:34:33 2023 UTC)
The migration crisis at the border of Belarus and Poland began in the autumn of 2021, when migrants from Iraq, Afghanistan, and Syria arrived in Minsk by air, in an attempt to seek asylum in other European countries.
The European Commission accused Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko's government of organizing illegal passage for migrants and orchestrating the humanitarian crisis, which Lukashenko denied.
