WARSAW —

       Turkey on Friday halted airline ticket sales to Iraqi, Syrian and Yemeni citizens wanting to travel to Belarus, which in recent months has become a key launching point for migrants and refugees trying to enter the European Union illegally.

       The move, announced by Turkey’s Civil Aviation Authority, follows EU pressure on airlines to stop bringing people from the Middle East to Minsk, the capital of Belarus.

       Starting from there, thousands of asylum-seekers have managed to slip into EU member nations Poland, Lithuania and Latvia since the summer, though many others have also been kept from entering or pushed back. EU and Polish officials have accused the longtime leader of Belarus, President Alexander Lukashenko, of facilitating illegal border crossings in retaliation for sanctions that the EU imposed on his government for its brutal crackdown on dissent following Lukashenko’s disputed reelection last year.

       The crisis, involving a large number of migrants stuck at the EU’s eastern border, threatens to become a humanitarian crisis as winter approaches. It is also creating another point of tension between the West and Belarus’ authoritarian regime.

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       On Friday, Russia sent paratroopers to the Grodno region in Belarus, which borders Poland, in a show of support for its ally. That follows Russia’s dispatch of nuclear-capable strategic bombers to patrol over Belarus for two consecutive days this week.

       Among them are Iraqi Kurds and Syrians fleeing conflict, persecution or poverty. Many aim to reach Germany or other Western European countries, sometimes to reunite with relatives already settled there.

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       Hundreds of migrants are massed at the Belarus-Poland border in what the European Union calls a deliberate attempt by Belarus to destabilize the bloc.

       In a brief statement posted on Twitter, Turkey’s aviation authority said its decision to halt ticket sales was in effect until further notice.

       Citing the Turkish decision, Belarusian airline Belavia said it also would not transport citizens of Iraq, Syria and Yemen on its Istanbul-Minsk flights starting Friday. Belavia said in a statement that it planned to reimburse the cost of already purchased tickets.

       The EU said it also has received confirmation that Iraqi Airlines will not resume flights to Minsk.

       German federal police reported Wednesday that 1,246 unauthorized entries to Germany “with a connection to Belarus” had been recorded in the first nine days of November. In all, there have been 9,087 such entries so far this year, German police said.

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       Fears that the authoritarian leader of Belarus is using migrants as a weapon to destabilize the European Union put new strains on the 27-nation bloc.

       Polish authorities said a large number of people remain just across the border in neighboring Belarus, and Polish border guards continue to rebuff attempts to enter Poland illegally each day.

       There are now hundreds of people, among them families with children, staying in makeshift camps on the Belarusian side of the border. Attempts to cross have become increasingly dangerous as Poland fortifies its side of the border and pushes people back. Temperatures at the border drop to below freezing at night.

       The World Health Organization said it sent an expert team to Lithuania to assess migrants held in reception facilities there and found that 60% were in need of some form of medical treatment.

       The organization’s Europe regional director, Dr. Hans Kluge, said he was “very concerned about the thousands of vulnerable people who are stranded in no-man’s-land on Belarus’ borders with Poland, Latvia and Lithuania, at the mercy of the weather as winter fast approaches.”

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       Kluge said that “women and children are sleeping outdoors in the bitter cold. Several people have already died. And COVID-19 cases are rising sharply across the region.” He stressed that people’s rights to health and shelter are protected by international law.

       A Polish official said the country’s ongoing conflict with Belarus’ government is not expected to de-escalate in the coming days. Pawel Soloch, the head of the National Security Bureau, said Poland was facing a “a psychological, hybrid war, waged consciously by centers that want to weaken or even ultimately destroy our country.”

       Poland’s Border Guards said in the previous day that they had recorded 223 attempts to illegally cross into Poland from Belarus, fewer than earlier in the week.

       To date, Poland has not asked Frontex, the EU border agency, to help, but has requested assistance in returning migrants to their home countries.

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       Frontex chief Fabrice Leggeri told EU lawmakers Thursday that there were 1,700 Iraqis to be returned from Poland to Iraq, with an initial group of 200 ready to travel. He said he asked the European Commission to help persuade Iraq to accept chartered flights, because it is easier to return 200 people on two flights than six or seven Iraqis every day on commercial flights.

       Leggeri also said that reports of gunshots fired from the Belarusian side of the border meant it would “not be a safe place to deploy an operation.”

       The Polish Defense Ministry said one group crossed a fence at the village of Kuznica but were stopped by officials. The ministry posted a video which it said showed the incident.

       The Border Guards agency posted another video on Twitter which it said shows Belarusian personnel using a green laser at the border.

       “We assume that these were attempts to blind our officers and soldiers patrolling the border,” the post said.

       The information was impossible to verify. Independent journalists face limits to their reporting in Belarus, and a state of emergency in Poland’s border zone prevents media from entering the area.