The search is still on for two-year-old Danka Ilic, who went missing on Tuesday in the settlement of Banjsko Polje near Bor in Serbia. Due to her disappearance, the “Find me” system was activated for the first time, based on the “Amber alert”. Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) also needs this system. Dobrica Kucalovic, advisor to the Minister of Security of BiH, Amela Efendic from EMMAUS, and the Federal Police Administrationinspector Sasa Petrovic, were asked why it hasn’t beenestablished yet.
Commenting on the case from Serbia, Petrovic pointed out that he is pessimistic about finding little Danka.
“Maybe I’m looking too darkly at all these things,” he said and clarified that, in his opinion, there are three things that can be suspected: Is it faked, did a child wander off, which is unlikely due to her age, and was it kidnapped?
Since the study visit to the United States (U.S.), nothing has been done
Efendic from EMMAUS thinks that in this case, an alert similar to the Amber alert was not activated in Serbia, so she explained how the Amber alert actually works.
“It was also activated late, several hours after the disappearance, which is not the case with the Amber alert. It is activated immediately after the disappearance. The Amber Alert itself works in a way that the police are the primary ones to initiate it and decide what information will be shared with the public so that everyone can participate in the search. Then they pass it on to an NGO and then to our Safer Internet Center, which does secondary alerting. The police are working to find the person,” explained Efendic.
A study visit to the U.S. by representatives of our country, where they were introduced to the Ambert Alert, was held in July 2023, and until today, nothing concrete has been done.
We are responsible for the safety of children
Kucalovic states that they sent letters to the police agencies, while the Federal Police Administration states that they did not receive them.
Interlocutors explained whether the institutions had done enough
“The police and security structure in BiH is complex, unlike in Serbia. Serbia also worked on it for six years. We returned in June last year from a study visit, and to implement this year, it is not too late. From an operational and technical point of view, it is simple, but from a legal point of view, it is a complex system. We waited for Europol, Frontex and we solved it all. We need everyone’s consensus, a lot of talks and meetings,” said the advisor to the Minister of Security of BiH, N1 writes.
E.Dz.