Artur Reszko/PAP

The Polish Interior Ministry has announced the closure of Poland’s border with Belarus to Russian and Belarusian freight vehicles until further notice owing to the Belarusian Supreme Court upheld an eight-year prison sentence handed down to a Belarusian-Polish activist.

A draft decree authorising the closure was published on Friday in the Government Legislation Centre.

Earlier on Friday, in a move described as “draconian” by Mariusz Kaminski, the Polish interior minister, the Supreme Court in Minsk rejected an appeal by Andrzej Poczobut, a journalist and Polish minority leader, against his sentence.

Poczobut was found guilty in February of “intentional actions aimed at inciting hostility and hatred on national, religious and social grounds” in a trial widely regarded as fraudulent.