Interior Ministry believes there is still no risk of reactivation of the Balkan migrant route.
Croatian police is daily monitoring illegal migration trends on the border with Serbia, and in the last two months have observed an increase in the number of attempted illegal crossings, announced the Interior Ministry in a statement. However, it believes there is still no risk of reactivation of the Balkan route which would affect Croatia, reports RTL on September 8, 2016.
Interior Minister Vlaho Orepić said that the Ministry regularly exchanged information with EU member states and Frontex, and received information from other countries as well. The police are also using information obtained with technical equipment, such as satellite and radar images, tracking vehicles and others.
The Ministry is also monitoring events in the wider region, especially the situation in Turkey and Greece, as well as measures taken by other EU members, particularly Hungary, said the Minister. The data he presented show that in the first eight months of this year, the border police recorded 2,395 illegal crossings.
However, the deployment of police officers and specialized equipment, which is in accordance with the risk analysis, confirms there is still no risk of reactivation of the Balkan route which would affect Croatia.
According to data collected about the status of migrants in Serbia, currently there are 1,415 migrants living in permanent accommodation facilities in that country, as well as 2,524 temporary migrants. Most of the migrants are citizens of Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iraq, which are nationalities which Hungarian authorities generally do not accept and return them to Serbia. Some of them later try to illegally cross the border between Serbia and Croatia.
Croatian border police is ready to respond to illegal border crossings with enough people and equipment. In the context of the integrated border management, in cooperation with other government agencies, it stands ready to solve all the relevant issues related to the possible migration influx.
