Polish farmers block border crossing with Ukraine in Mercosur trade protest – report

Audio By Carbonatix

WARSAW (Reuters) – Farmers blocked Poland’s Medyka border crossing with Ukraine on Saturday, news agency PAP reported, in protest over the trade deal between the European Union and Mercosur , which they say will reduce their competitiveness.

The farmers are also protesting because their demand for Poland to maintain the agricultural tax at the 2023 level in 2024 has not been met.

Poland’s Minister of Agriculture said he supported the farmers’ demands regarding the Mercosur agreement and the government will address this at its next meeting. Mercosur is a trade bloc of South American countries.

“The farmers’ protest in Medyka has the same goal, for which I have been fighting on various fronts for a long time,” Czeslaw Siekierski wrote on X.

“Let me remind you that we said NO to the agreement with the Mercosur countries in the Ministry of Agriculture.”

During Saturday’s blockade, which is expected to last 24 hours, about 30 people walked along the pedestrian crossing with trucks from Ukraine blocked from entering and only one truck an hour allowed to leave Poland, PAP reported.

“For now, there are no difficulties,” Anita Pukalska of the Przemyśl municipal police headquarters, was quoted as saying of the farmers’ blockade, which does not apply to passenger vehicles, buses, humanitarian and military transport.

(Reporting by Pawel Florkiewicz; Editing by Alexander Smith)