A group of bikers from the infamous pro-Kremlin Night Wolves club, heading for Germany to celebrate the anniversary of victory over the Nazis, was denied entry to Poland Sunday, officials said.
The seven bikers were turned back at the Terespol-Brest post on the border between Belarus and Poland for "security" reasons, border guards said.
They were four Slovaks, two Germans and a Russian. The refusal was justified by the need to "guarantee public order", said Terespol border guards spokesman Dariusz Siennicki.
They were hoping to join some other Russian bikers already in Poland after entering at other border points, and a few dozen Polish bikers who were to escort them across the country.
"They didn't let them enter Poland, citing security reasons. It's crazy. We are heading back to Warsaw without them," the head of the Rajd Katynski Polish bikers' group, Wiktor Wegrzyn, told AFP by phone.
Poland said Friday it had banned a group of Russian motorbikers from crossing its territory on their way to Berlin on concerns that some may belong to the Night Wolves club, fiercely loyal to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The bikers want to cross central Europe on their way to the German capital to celebrate the 71st anniversary of World War II victory on May 9.
Last year, the Night Wolves were also banned from entering Poland amid tense relations between Moscow and Warsaw.
The Russian foreign ministry last week called the ban a "malevolent and cynical gesture", designed to "prevent a group of Russian citizens from paying a tribute to Soviet soldiers killed while liberating Europe from fascism".
"It is particularly outrageous because Russian authorities allowed Poland to organise a commemorative ceremony in Smolensk, Russia in April" at the site of the 2010 plane crash that killed Polish president Lech Kaczynski and a host of the country's high-ranking officials, the ministry added in a statement.
Established in 1989, shortly before the break-up of the Soviet Union, the Night Wolves comprise 5,000 members from across the territory of the former eastern empire.
The motorbikers have appeared in Crimea, the Ukrainian peninsula annexed by Russia in March 2014, as well as in the eastern Ukrainian separatist region of Lugansk, where several Night Wolves joined the pro-Russian rebel army.
A group of bikers from the infamous pro-Kremlin Night Wolves club, heading for Germany to celebrate the anniversary of victory over the Nazis, was denied entry to Poland Sunday, officials said.
The seven bikers were turned back at the Terespol-Brest post on the border between Belarus and Poland for “security” reasons, border guards said.
They were four Slovaks, two Germans and a Russian. The refusal was justified by the need to “guarantee public order”, said Terespol border guards spokesman Dariusz Siennicki.
They were hoping to join some other Russian bikers already in Poland after entering at other border points, and a few dozen Polish bikers who were to escort them across the country.
“They didn’t let them enter Poland, citing security reasons. It’s crazy. We are heading back to Warsaw without them,” the head of the Rajd Katynski Polish bikers’ group, Wiktor Wegrzyn, told AFP by phone.
Poland said Friday it had banned a group of Russian motorbikers from crossing its territory on their way to Berlin on concerns that some may belong to the Night Wolves club, fiercely loyal to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The bikers want to cross central Europe on their way to the German capital to celebrate the 71st anniversary of World War II victory on May 9.
Last year, the Night Wolves were also banned from entering Poland amid tense relations between Moscow and Warsaw.
The Russian foreign ministry last week called the ban a “malevolent and cynical gesture”, designed to “prevent a group of Russian citizens from paying a tribute to Soviet soldiers killed while liberating Europe from fascism”.
“It is particularly outrageous because Russian authorities allowed Poland to organise a commemorative ceremony in Smolensk, Russia in April” at the site of the 2010 plane crash that killed Polish president Lech Kaczynski and a host of the country’s high-ranking officials, the ministry added in a statement.
Established in 1989, shortly before the break-up of the Soviet Union, the Night Wolves comprise 5,000 members from across the territory of the former eastern empire.
The motorbikers have appeared in Crimea, the Ukrainian peninsula annexed by Russia in March 2014, as well as in the eastern Ukrainian separatist region of Lugansk, where several Night Wolves joined the pro-Russian rebel army.
