This report examines the legal situation of Belarusian nationals residing in Poland five years after the 2020 protests, assessing the special legislative measures introduced in the intervening period and identifying systemic gaps that require legislative or interpretative intervention. The empirical basis of the report comprises monitoring of over 1,400 individual cases handled by the Partyzanka Foundation in the first quarter of 2026, supplemented by a doctrinal legal analysis of applicable statutes, statistical data, and the work of international human rights authorities.
Poland occupies a unique position as the primary country of refuge for Belarusians in Europe: as of 1 April 2026, over 139,000 held valid residence documents, Poland registered approximately 90% of all European asylum applications submitted by this group, and the recognition rate stood at a sustained average of 97%. The legislative response of 2020-2025 – comprising humanitarian visas, the Poland.Business Harbour programme, a dedicated residence permit for holders of such visas, and preferential access to the Polish travel document for foreigners – was nonetheless fragmented in character and failed to produce a coherent legal framework commensurate with the durability and complexity of politically-motivated migration from Belarus. The analyzed data was collected up to January 2026.
The report identifies four main areas requiring urgent attention. The first concerns the Polish travel document for foreigners: the document lacks a statutory status as an identity document, resulting in the exclusion of its holders from banking and administrative transactions; its one-year validity period is misaligned with the duration of residence proceedings; the statutory grounds for its issuance do not cover passport invalidation by Belarusian authorities as an act of transnational repression, nor the exhaustion of a passport’s pages; and the practice of regional authorities effectively precludes issuance in cases of loss rather than theft. The second area concerns labour market access: applicants for international protection lose their right to work in the gap between the expiry of their prior residence title and the six-month threshold from the date of application, despite having previously worked lawfully, and the UdSC’s published guidance fails to address this adequately. The third area concerns the temporary identity certificate (TZTC): the expiry of a TZTC before a new document is collected prevents recipients from collecting correspondence, cash benefits, and deliveries, creating a procedural vicious circle that requires an organisational rather than a legislative solution. The fourth area concerns persons residing in Poland on the basis of a residence permit granted in connection with a humanitarian visa: the one-time nature of this residence basis, combined with the absence of a renewal mechanism, forces persons with genuinely protection-related reasons for migration to rely on economic residence instruments or to enter the international protection procedure, while years of lawful residence under a humanitarian visa should not be treated as a factor undermining the credibility of a subsequent protection claim.
The report sets out recommendations in two categories: measures available without statutory amendment – including the issuance of interpretative guidance by UdSC, communications to Polish Post and air carriers, and the correct application of existing provisions on alternative documents – and legislative changes, encompassing the formal designation of the Polish travel document as an identity document, the extension of its validity to at least two years, the broadening of grounds for its issuance through a general clause covering transnational repression, alignment of those grounds with the temporary travel document, and the preservation of the right to work during protection proceedings. The report further calls for consideration of a comprehensive legislative package addressing the legal situation of Belarusian nationals in Poland and – in broader perspective – the activation of the national temporary protection mechanism available under Article 107(1) of the Act on Granting Protection to Foreigners in the Territory of the Republic of Poland.
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The views expressed in this material are the sole responsibility of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the position of the Ideas Bank team.
