Serbia Battles to Stem Migrant Invasion

Serbian, Hungarian and Austrian police in a joint operation arrested 17 people in Serbia on Tuesday, suspected of smuggling several hundred migrants into and through the country.

Serbian Interior Minister Ivica Dacic said the arrests were of great importance and would have an impact on the forthcoming EU decision on Serbia's candidate country status. EU leaders are due to decide on this issue on December 9 in Brussels.

"This is not the first operation of this type but it will certainly have an impact on the [EU] Council of Ministers, as this issue was one of the important topics at previous meetings," Dacic said.

Up till the end of October, police filed 127 criminal charges against 252 persons accused of smuggling more than 1,000 illegal migrants into Serbia.

But immigrants are still coming in. Serbian customs found 12 hidden in a truck that tried to enter Serbia on the southern border crossing at Presevo on Tuesday.

Since the EU lifted visa requirements for Serbia in December 2009, the number of illegal immigrants entering the country has significantly increased.

In the first ten months of 2011, police found more than 6,000 illegal migrants on Serbian soil. A few years ago the annual number was only about 750.

Most enter from Macedonia. This year 1,700 sought asylum status. But Serbia is not a destination point for these asylum seekers, just a stop-over on the way to Western Europe.  

If they are arrested, they face charges and fines of 7,000 to 10,000 dinars [€70 to €100]. As many cannot pay such fees, they receive a custodial sentence.

“After they are released they are obliged to leave the country but there are no controls ensuring they’ve obeyed the order,” Rados Djurovic, head of Serbia's Asylum Protection Centre, said.

Illegal immigrants can often be seen hanging around train stations in Serbia. Many lurk around the northern border town of Subotica, waiting to enter EU member state Hungary.

“As we have readmission agreement with Hungary, if their police arrest them, they are sent back to Serbia, so they just go back and forth, back and forth,” Djurovic said.

But he explained that Serbia did not have readmission agreement with most of the countries from which the immigrants came, so these people cannot easily be deported.

“Serbia would have to sign readmission agreements [to deport them] and then check with their embassies that these people really are the citizens of alleged country," he added.

Many don’t have any papers and many of their countries of origin, such as Afghanistan, don’t have efficient registries. "The costs of deportation can be enormous,” Djurovic said.

He believes that even deportation wouldn’t help solve the issue, as people who are determined to leave their homelands rarely change their minds.

“Deportation has a boomerang effect. When someone who spent four years in Western Europe goes back and starts telling stories of the better life to be found there, four more people are drawn to follow him out of the country,” Djurovic explained.