Minister of Security in the Council of Ministers Selmo Cikotic said after a two-day visit to the Una Sana Canton (USC) that one of the priorities, in order to control and reduce the entry of migrants into Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) from Serbia and Montenegro, would be to strengthen security of the eastern border.
Cikotic, who was in Bihac area on Tuesday, and yesterday in the area of Velika Kladusa, where he talked about the escalation of the migrant crisis with cantonal and local officials, and also visited the camp in the village Lipa and the camp “Miral”, pointed out that he got clearer view regarding the situation in the area of USC after this visit, Klix.ba news portal reports.
“We have agreed on certain mechanisms and more concrete and efficient cooperation of local and cantonal authorities with BiH institutions, so that citizens could feel a greater degree of safety,” Cikotic said.
He mentioned that the goal for the future is to manage the migrant crisis from the level of BiH, and thus disburden the cantonal authorities, and he pointed out that “there is no magic wand” so the results of future activities on preventing the migrant crisis will be experienced after a while.
Cikotic stated that the plan for managing the migrant crisis in BiH contains of seven priorities, 21 measures and 116 activities, and he emphasized that the migrant crisis cannot be solved immediately.
“We will try to increase the total amount of budget funds for these activities from domestic and international funds, and we will try to improve the coordination between police agencies in BiH that do not have enough cooperation, to handle the burden of the migrant crisis throughout BiH. We will also start with the system of controlling all the institutions which are responsible for this issue in order to sanction reluctance and irresponsibility,” Cikotic pointed out.
