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Sarajevo; Bosnia\u2019s Service for Foreigners\u2019 Affairs, SFA, on the orders of the country\u2019s Security Ministry, has begun preparing a list of illegal economic migrants for deportation, Slobodan Ujic, the director of the SFA, confirmed to BIRN on Thursday.<\/p>\n
Security Minister Fahrudin Radoncic has ordered the SFA to compile a list of the estimated 9,000 to 10,000 illegal migrants to be deported, excluding refugees from war-torn Syria.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is a huge security problem that is destroying the lives of our citizens, both in Sarajevo and in Bihac \u2013 everywhere,\u201d Radoncic said on Wednesday, referring to the migrant hotspot of Bihac, in the northwest of the country, near the EU border.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs security minister, I demand that .. all those migrants who came from countries that are richer than Bosnia be deported,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
The minister explained that he had asked those countries to give Bosnia money to cover the cost of the air flights that would take them back to their home countries. He also said that the money the European Union currently gives to Bosnia to keep illegal migrants inside the country should be used to fly them out of Bosnia instead.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are not inhumane, but we now have 30,000, 40,000 or 50,000 unemployed, while keeping 10,000 illegal migrants in full force. While they are waiting here, we have become a parking lot for migrants for Europe. That is not going to happen!\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Ujic explained that the list of people to be deported mainly refers to illegal migrants from countries like Pakistan, Afghanistan, Algeria, and Morocco.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are working on two things. The first is a survey to determine which migrants would agree to be voluntarily returned to their country, and the second is to identify the migrants\u2019 identities,\u201d Ujic told BIRN.<\/p>\n
Ujic said he doubted many migrants would volunteer to be sent home. The information from the field was most did not want to cooperate with the survey, throw away the survey sheets, and do not even want to talk about returning home.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese people have traveled thousands of kilometers, for months, and are now at the door of the European Union. They don\u2019t want to return,\u201d Ujic admitted.<\/p>\n
He also said Bosnia was the only country in the Western Balkans that had secured the voluntary return of some migrants in recent years. In cooperation with the International Organisation for Migrants, IOM, Bosnia had returned about 1,300 migrants in the last two years, he said.<\/p>\n
Ujic said establishing migrants\u2019 identities had long been a problem because the embassies of the countries from which they come do not want to cooperate either.<\/p>\n
\u201cOne example is Pakistan, from where many migrants come. They say they cannot help us identify migrants based on biometric data. They say they only have biometric databases for those who have committed a crime,\u201d Ujic said, adding that the Bosnian Security Ministry would have to solve this problem.<\/p>\n