Twenty-six years old Dževad, born in Jaghori district in Afghanistan, traveled about 7.500 kilometers fleeing bombs, blood, war, killing...
"My family stayed there and I wasn't allowed because my life was in danger because I decided six years ago not to be a Muslim anymore. I was threatened with death. According to them, anyone who is outside the religion deserves death. That was the main reason why I had to leave Afghanistan," he says.
With some money, the most basic things in his backpack, he left his family in September of last year and set off on a journey.
For five months, he walked across the country from which he fled, Iran, Turkey, Greece, Albania, Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Slovenia, Italy... At the end of January, he reached Switzerland.
On the way to a better life, Dževad spent several days in Montenegro in November 2019. The reporter met him in Pljevlje, from where he left for Bosnia and Herzegovina. With a backpack on his back and a sleeping bag in the city park, he waited for the first darkness to continue.
He told that he was staying in the camp at Konik, that he arrived in Pljevlja that day, but he did not want to reveal who was waiting for them and who organized their transport to the school in the village of Boljanići. However, the journalist team followed them and discovered that taxi drivers were driving them to the border.
"From here we're going on foot, over the mountain," Dževad said then, as he and his team turned off the main road towards the border...
Today, he says, he is finally sleeping in a warm place, in conditions worthy of a human being, not afraid of persecution and returning to the country from which he fled to save his life.
“I'm staying here. They can get a job or continue their education. There are a lot of Afghans in Switzerland, they accept us because our country is at war. However, just the feeling of being a migrant is very bad. Today, the police detained me for an hour because of this, but they did not insult me or cause me any problems. I had all the documents they gave me with me, with them I can travel all over Switzerland. When I was released, I went to the Immigration office and complained that I had been arrested even though I had not caused any trouble. They were called, but they couldn't explain why, so they told me at the Immigration Office that they would inform me when they investigated the case, but also that in eight days my last interview for obtaining asylum is," says Dževad.
3.000 euros for "help".
He reluctantly remembers the hell he's been through in the five months since he left home.
He says, there was everything - running away from the police, returning from the border, cold nights in the wilds of foreign countries, hunger, loneliness, fear, frozen feet, fatigue... There were also those who see the suffering of refugees as a source of income - smugglers looking for fabulous figures...
"I paid a lot of money to be smuggled from Iran to Turkey, but also to be transferred from Turkey to Greece. In Montenegro, I only paid for the bus ticket from Podgorica to Pljevlja and the taxi driver who took me from that city to near the border with Bosnia and Herzegovina. I know those with money get safe passage, but... I had no money for their services and walked. I've been walking almost all the time since I left the house and started running."
Dzevad talks about the horrors in the camp for refugees and migrants on the Greek island of Lesbos, which burned down when his compatriots clashed with the police.
"There was a stampede, people trampled each other, someone tried to extinguish the part where someone was with a jet of water, the authorities stood and watched as the fire engulfed everything...".
He moved on the same day, although, as he says, a lawyer from Athens offered him "help" to get a Greek passport.
He tells that he walked for a week through Albania, reached Montenegro, then Bosnia, which was extremely difficult for him, especially because of the attitude of people towards migrants.
"They were kind to me in Montenegro, my problem was only the Montenegrin mountains. Bosnia was really horrible. People treated us horribly, the police too. The conditions and mutual relations in the camp in Hadžići were desperate. Everyone treated us horribly - I stand in line waiting for food stamps and they tell me come tomorrow. Then I go to the restaurant, I want to pay for the food, they kick me out. That's racism. People need to understand that we are refugees. Our country is at war, we have no home".
Dževad also tells that the smugglers, who are looking for victims in the camp in Hadžići, asked him for 3.100 euros to take him to Italy.
“They guaranteed safe passage, but I didn't have that much money. I gave almost everything I have to smugglers in Iran and Turkey. I stayed in the camp for 15 days until I rested and my wounded feet recovered, and with three migrants from Iran I set off for Croatia. Everyone said that it is difficult to cross the Croatian border and that their policemen treat refugees terribly. Two days before we left, they arrested several of them, beat them and deported them back to Bosnia. Nevertheless, we set off. We walked at night and were caught at the border. The four of us. They sent us back".
They did not discourage him, he tried again. And succeeded.
"Four of us started again. Three of them were caught by the police at the border with Croatia and they returned them, but they did not return me. I continued on my way. It was a difficult and scary part of my journey, like a nightmare. Completely alone in an unknown country, I survived terrible, cold nights through the forests of Croatia and Slovenia. When I saw the lights of Italy it was a little easier for me, but it was still a very dangerous journey".
A similar fate was experienced by thousands of migrants and refugees who passed through Montenegro. Dozens of them try to illegally cross into Bosnia and Herzegovina every night, in order to continue to the countries of the European Union, but there are no official data on how many of them succeed in this.
Sent to quarantine, doctors monitor their condition
Official data from the International Office for Migration (IOM) show that in the first 69 days of 2020, 1.151 migrants/refugees entered Montenegro. All of them sought asylum.
"During the week from March 9 to 16, 62 migrants entered, after which the arrivals stopped completely. All migrants who found themselves on the territory of Montenegro are isolated, and those who were not in the Reception Center or in alternative accommodation at the time of the introduction of the Government's measures are sent to quarantine. The IOM Mobile Team is still on the ground and provides all the necessary support to the migrants, so that they do not have to leave the isolation," said the head of the IOM office in Montenegro. Dusica Zivkovic.
She states that the Reception Center employs health workers who regularly monitor the health condition of migrants.
From January 1 to March 9, 2019, there were 876 migrants in Montenegro, she said. Živković specified that the IOM recorded the most migrants and refugees from Morocco.
"We record the most arrivals from Morocco (783), Algeria (191), Pakistan (32), Syria (32) and Iran (19). In the mentioned period, there were: 1.134 men, 12 women and five children (two boys and three girls) among the registered migrants.
The fact that in less than two and a half months, 31,39 percent more migrants entered Montenegro than last year, does not mean that a migrant crisis is on the threshold, she assessed.
"At the moment, all movements are under control and we do not expect any significant increase in the number of migrants passing through Montenegro. Of course, all developments depend on several factors, but in any case, a crisis like the one we had in North Macedonia and Serbia in 2015 is not expected," said Živković.
Increased space for criminal groups
The increase in the number of migrants and refugees, however, increases the space for organized criminal groups to operate, which, along with them, smuggle drugs, weapons..., the criminologist assessed. Velimir Veljo Rakočević.
"We have both a global and a regional problem. Especially in the part related to the situation in Turkey, where migrants and refugees already have a problem entering the territory of the European Union, that is, Greece. However, regardless of how strong the border is, a part of them manages to cross it, and all these sudden migration movements carry a certain danger - that criminals are also smuggled in."
Rakočević also explains that, in addition to criminals who cross borders in this way, it also benefits "other carriers of criminal activities."
"Especially to organized criminal groups and carriers of organized crime in the field of people smuggling. They very skilfully use it to achieve their incriminated goals, not only for smuggling people, but also for smuggling narcotics, weapons, trafficking in people, children... Therefore, it has multiplicative effects in that it always complicates, if not worsens, the security situation . As for our territory, if there was a larger influx of migrants, it would be a big security challenge".
Rakočević also explained why those who are arrested as smugglers of migrants and refugees are not responsible for human trafficking.
"Ours apply a strict legal provision. What they are arrested for are the elements of the criminal offense of human smuggling, and for the elements of the criminal offense of human trafficking, other conditions would have to be met, in terms of multiple stages, methods of execution, purpose... Human trafficking is a much stricter criminal offense, from the group crimes against humanity, is one of the most serious crimes, and these are much milder crimes. For now, what we can see in our country, there is no human trafficking".
According to the insiders, migrants allegedly enter Bosnia and Herzegovina from Montenegro every day, bypassing the official border crossings, most often with the help of a wide network of smugglers. However, arrests of smugglers are not that common.
On March 10, the Podgorica High Court confirmed the indictment against a ten-member criminal group for smuggling migrants. Those who "transported" migrants close to the border admitted that they received a hundred euros each from the organizers. It was not specified how much the migrants paid for the services of the head of that criminal group.
European policemen will control the borders with Montenegrin
Minister of Interior Affairs Mevludin Nuhodzic at the beginning of March, he presented in the Parliament the Bill on the confirmation of the status agreement between Montenegro and the European Union on the activities carried out by the European Border and Coast Guard Agency (FRONTEX) in Montenegro.
At that time, he announced that strengthening international cooperation is imperative in the work of the Ministry of the Interior, and that is why one of the mechanisms in the fight against illegal migration is the strengthening of partnership relations with the European Union through the Cooperation Agreement with FRONTEX.
"After the agreement enters into force, depending on the assessment, European police officers will conduct border checks together with our police, and the European Union will provide our country with expert training and professional assistance in monitoring those parts of the border that are adjacent to an EU member state. This will allow us to respond even more quickly to the potential challenges of illegal migration, which, among other things, are a possible source of organized crime and terrorism," he said.
He also said that the national migration system of no country, no matter how developed, cannot deal with the problem of illegal migration on its own:
"Security challenges know no geographical boundaries. We must not and will not allow smugglers and human traffickers to cooperate better than law enforcement authorities," said Nuhodžić, emphasizing that illegal migration, cross-border crime, migrant smuggling and human trafficking are challenges that the Western Balkans and the European Union face together.
The text was taken from the website of the Society of Professional Journalists
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