This week marked one year since Poland's pivotal general election which resulted in victory for a four-party coalition government made up of pro-EU parties.
In that election campaign, current Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk had promised to curb irregular migration, outflanking the then-ruling nationalist government on the issue.
One year on, Mr Tusk is still talking tough on migration.
"We need to regain 100% control over who comes to Poland," he said at his Civic Coalition party's convention last Saturday.
At that event, Mr Tusk said that his government's new migration strategy would include a proposal to temporarily suspend the right to asylum.
That strategy was agreed upon by the Polish cabinet during the week and states that the government wants to "stop illegal immigration" on the country’s eastern border with Belarus.
"If the state is threatened by an influx of immigrants, it should be possible to temporarily and territorially suspend the right to accept asylum applications," read a Polish government statement summing up a resolution adopted by the Polish cabinet.
The strategy also sets out proposals for migrants to access the Polish labour market to make up for job shortages in the particular sectors and integrate migrant communities.
The Polish government estimates that 2.5 million foreign nationals now live in the country. The vast majority are Ukrainian nationals, but an increasing number of work visas have been issued to citizens of non-European countries since 2015.
But irregular migration has become a main focus for Mr Tusk in recent months.
Since 2021, the current and previous Polish governments have accused Russia and Belarus of encouraging migrants, mostly from the Middle East and Africa, to cross into Poland from Belarus.
The Polish government views this as part of a "hybrid war" strategy by Moscow and Minsk to destabilise Poland and the rest of the EU.
More than 26,000 migrants have attempted to cross the border into Poland so far this year according to Poland's defence minister.
A similar number of migrants attempted crossings throughout 2023, according to data from the Polish Border Guard.
discussing the government's new migration strategy for 2025-2030.
Mr Tusk chose to announce his plan ahead of the EU summit in Brussels this week where the topic of migration policy was discussed, and has said his government's migration strategy would be "a proposal for the entire European Union".
A statement issued at the end of the summit said EU leaders expressed "solidarity with Poland and with member states facing these challenges.
"Exceptional situations require appropriate measures," added the statement.
It hinted that Poland may be given some leeway on its proposal to limit asylum claims on its eastern border.
Mr Tusk, who was previously President of the European Council from 2014 to 2019, and whose own Civic Coalition party is a member of the centre-right European People's Party, still holds sway in Brussels circles.
It would be hard to imagine such leniency were Hungary's Prime Minister Viktor Orbán to suggest a similar move to suspend asylum claims in his country.
However, breaking entirely with EU law on asylum rights may just not be a realistic option for the Polish government.
A spokesperson for European Commission told Politico earlier in the week that EU member states "have international and EU obligations, including the obligation to provide access to the asylum procedure".
More than 60 NGOs and human rights organisations have urged Mr Tusk and his government to not follow through with the proposal to introduce measures that would temporarily halt the right to asylum.
Malgorzata Szuleka, a lawyer from the Warsaw office of the Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights, told RTÉ News that Mr Tusk's proposal was "legally, virtually impossible" to implement.
The right to asylum, she said, is defined in EU law and the UN's Geneva Convention, as well as the Polish constitution.
"My concern is that the applied policy of pushbacks doesn't serve the purpose of security because there are vulnerable groups. We have documented cases of unaccompanied children, persons with disabilities or elderly persons who are subjected to pushbacks numerous times," said Ms Szuleka.
"Instead of migration policy, we have migration politics in Poland," she added.
NGOs have accused Polish authorities of 'pushbacks' where migrants, who have crossed into Poland, are returned to the Belarusian side of the border.
The border has been heavily militarised since late 2021 when thousands of migrants, many from the Middle East, became stuck between Belarusian security forces and the Polish military and border force on either side of the border.
Poland's previous Law and Justice government ordered the construction of a 5.5-metre steel fence along the 186km border and the current government now deploys around 17,000 soldiers in the area to prevent crossings by migrants.
In June, the Polish government placed an exclusion zone along a 60km stretch of the border which prevents access to within 200 metres of the border and extends to 2km exclusion zone near forested areas.
This followed the death in May of a 21-year-old Polish soldier who was stabbed while on patrol at the border. The Polish army said a migrant was responsible for the fatal incident.
In July, Poland's parliament approved a bill to allow military personnel and security forces to use their firearms along the border in cases of self-defence, a move that was criticised by Polish NGOs assisting migrants in the area.
Just over 9,500 people claimed asylum in Poland in 2023.
About 75% of those applications came from citizens of Belarus, Ukraine and Russia meaning the number of asylum applicants from Middle East and African countries remains small.
Most migrants who do cross the border from Belarus into Poland continue west, often heading for Germany.
However, last month's introduction of border checks by German authorities to prevent irregular crossings at the German-Polish border has made it more difficult for migrants to journey west, placing the onus on Warsaw to further tighten its border security along its border with Belarus.
The proposal to temporarily halt the right to asylum was adopted by the Polish cabinet on Tuesday despite dissenting views from four left-wing ministers whose members of parliament have voiced concern over the proposal in recent days.
