Good morning. Welcome to Axios today. It's November 17th. We've made it to Wednesday. I'm Nailibudu.

Here's what you need to know today. The latest on treating COVID with a pill. Plus,

new guidance around transgender and intersex Olympic athletes. But first, migrants trapped at

the Poland Belarus border is today's one big thing.

Tensions are rising in Eastern Europe on the border between Belarus and Poland.

Yesterday, Polish police began using water cannons and tear gas against people trying to cross

into the country. For weeks now, thousands of migrants from Iraq, Syria, and Afghanistan

have been waiting at the border in an attempt to enter the European Union. And what EU leaders

are calling a manufactured crisis. Axios National Security Reporter Zach Basu joins us now

with the big picture. Zach, what's happening at the border right now?

So as you mentioned, there are currently thousands of migrants actually camped out on the border

between Belarus and Poland. And in effect, the border between Belarus and the European Union.

Temperatures are below freezing and many of these desperate migrants, including women and

children, don't have access to food and water. And then from a security standpoint,

Polish authorities have accused Belarusian forces of ordering groups of migrants to storm the

barbed wire fence and attack Polish police officers with stones and bottles and even some reports

of stun grenades. European leaders have also alleged that Belarusian dictator Alexander Lukashenko

has manufactured this crisis that he's using these migrants to create these images of chaos.

Why are they saying that?

Yes, so there are credible reports of Belarus granting visas to migrants coming from places like

Iraq, flying them to the capital of Minsk and then transporting them to the border and either leaving

them to be stranded or actively encouraging them to rush the fences to cross into Europe and claim

...