ZAGREB, September 26, 2019 – In the first eight months of 2019, Croatian border police arrested and processed 11,813 migrants who attempted to illegally enter the country, which is 3,609 more persons than in 2018 and as many as 8,019 more persons than in the same period of 2018, the Jutarnji List daily of Thursday reports.
The daily quotes official figures from the Ministry of the Interior which show that police stopped 49 people on a daily basis while they were trying to illegally cross the border into the country.
However, the total number of illegal migrants processed by Croatian police in the first eight months is far higher because in the same period, Slovenian police returned to Croatia 6,447 illegal migrants.
Those people managed to cross Croatian territory into Slovenia, where they were arrested and returned to Croatia in line with international regulations. Based on these figures, it can be concluded that 18,260 illegal migrants entered Croatia in the period from 1 January to 31 August.
The daily wonders where those 18,260 people are and concludes that they have been sent back to Bosnia and Herzegovina and Serbia without having been offered protection.
If the influx of migrants continues at the current rate, Croatian police could arrest more than 15,000 migrants by the end of the year, which is by far the highest number since March 2016, when a large wave of people arriving in Europe from the Middle East, Asia and Africa was stopped.
Leading police and border officials warned at a meeting of the coordinating committee for homeland security on Tuesday that the situation with illegal migrants has been growing more and more serious.
More news about migrant crisis can be found in the Politics section.
