Russian strikes on Ukrainian territory and the accompanying air raids are significantly slowing down traffic at the Ukrainian-Polish border. According to the Polish Customs and Tax Services, waiting times for customs clearance of trucks reach up to 40 hours at certain border crossing points. This was reported by RBC-Ukraine, citing Polish Radio. The delays affect not only freight transport, but also private vehicles and buses.
Cause of Delays: Regular Air Raid Alerts
Traffic at border crossings in the Lublin Voivodeship is periodically suspended due to the threat of Russian strikes. According to Michał Deruś, a spokesperson for the tax administration in Lublin, nine air raid alerts due to bomb threat warnings were issued within a few hours at night, and several more warnings were announced in the morning. „This entails a temporary suspension of freight clearance, as well as the movement of private transport and buses,“ Deruś noted. It is these scheduled stops that create the queues that accumulate over the course of the day.
Scale of Queues at Checkpoints
The largest delays have been recorded at several border checkpoints. According to the Polish Customs and Tax Services, 880 trucks are waiting for clearance in Hrebenne, and another 250 in Zosin. Information is also circulating on social media about queues lasting more than 10 hours, particularly at the Krakivets and Shehyni crossings, with the situation varying significantly depending on the mode of transport and the specific checkpoint.
What Was Cleared Over the Past Day
Despite the delays, over the past 24 hours, customs and tax service workers in the Lublin Voivodeship processed and cleared more than 3,000 trucks and over 3,700 passenger cars. This indicates that border and customs control is operating under heavy load but is not stopping entirely — traffic resumes after each air raid alert ends.
Context: Previous Incidents in the Region
The current situation is not isolated. Earlier, on October 16, a danger warning was declared in one of Poland's voivodeships due to a Russian attack on Ukrainian regions, and on October 10, Poland scrambled military aircraft during a nighttime Russian attack on Ukraine. Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk previously reported the evacuation of two checkpoints during one of the Russian attacks on facilities near the Ukrainian-Polish border. Thus, delays at the border are becoming a systemic consequence of ongoing strikes on the border areas of Ukraine.
