WARSAW — The Polish army is pulling out of a position it occupied in the Czech Republic, the military high command said Thursday.
Polish forces set up a border control post along the twisty Polish-Czech border last month, as part of border closures due to the coronavirus pandemic. They blocked a path running on the Czech side of the frontier to a historic chapel, prompting a complaint from Czech authorities to Warsaw.
“There was a misunderstanding on the Polish side, the chapel is already accessible,” Hana Malá, a Czech foreign ministry spokesperson, told Czech media.
The Polish military said Thursday that the move was “a misunderstanding and not an intentional action, and was immediately corrected.”
Poland and the Czechs have a history of much more serious border frictions. They fought a brief war in early 1919, Poland annexed part of the border region in 1938 and the two almost came to blows again after World War II.