Migrants Trapped in Balkan 'No-man's Land', Amnesty

Refugees seeking to enter Western Europe are routinely subjected to unlawful push-backs and ill-treatment by police on the Macedonian border with Greece and on the Serbian border with Macedonia, a new report by Amnesty International says.

The report is based on four research missions to Serbia, Hungary, Greece and Macedonia between July 2014 and March 2015 and on interviews with more than 100 refugees and migrants, mostly from  countries such as Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia and Eritrea.

Migrants are arbitrarily detained by the authorities and their irregular status also makes them vulnerable to financial exploitation by law enforcement officers, who misuse their authority to demand bribes, according to the report.

Gauri van Gulik, Amnesty International's Deputy Director for Europe and Central Asia, said that refugees on their way across the Balkans towards Western Europe routinely find themselves abused and exploited and lef to the mercy of failing asylum systems.

"Serbia and Macedonia have to do much more to respect migrants and refugees rights. But it is impossible to separate the human rights violations there from the broader pressures of the flow of migrants and refugees into and through the EU and a failed EU migration system," she said.

Refugees and migrants are also vulnerable to financial exploitation by smugglers and to attacks by criminal groups. Two Nigerian men told Amnesty International how they were held up in Macedonia: "Nine men attacked us with knives. We went to the police to ask for help?but they arrested us."

In Macedonia, Amnesty International found that refugees and migrants are frequently arbitrarily detained in degrading conditions at the Reception Centre for Foreigners called Gazi Baba in the...