Teams of the European Border and Coast Guard Agency (FRONTEX) are soon to arrive on the Croatia-Bosnia border because of the migrant pressure, European Commissioner Vytenis Povilas Andriukaitis said on Thursday and added that the greatest responsibility for the situation on the border lies with Sarajevo and Zagreb.
Negotiations with Bosnia and Herzegovina concerning the deployment of FRONTEX teams have been completed and an agreement will be signed soon. That agreement will enable border police to manage the border between Bosnia and Croatia, however, the most important responsibility is in the hands of those two countries, Andriukaitis said during a debate on the status of migrants in Bosnia currently located near the border with the European Union.
Andriukaitis recalled that currently there are 5,139 migrants and asylum seekers being cared for in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Of that number, 3,126 are located in the canton in the northwest of the country near the border with Croatia and about 1,000 migrants have still not requested assistance, he said in a plenary session of the European Parliament during a debate on the issue, moved by Croatian MEP Ivan Jakovčić (IDS/ALDE).
According to Andriukaitis, since June this year, the European Union has provided Bosnia and Herzegovina with two million euro in humanitarian aid and 7.2 million euro through special measures and instruments for pre-accession support, and all the measures are being implemented with the assistance of the International Organisation for Migration (IOM), UNHCR and UNICEF.
Over the past few weeks, 180 additional police officers have been deployed to Bosnia and Herzegovina to improve security at the border, HINA reported.
