Human rights groups have warned that the closure of three migrant refugee shelters along the Balkan Route will prompt alternative routes that are equally perilous and riddled with smugglers and traffickers.
“This is just a strategy to prevent people from entering Serbia,” said Alice Pezzutti of No Name Kitchen, an independent humanitarian organization that provides aid to people along the Balkan Route.
Pezzutti told InfoMigrants that the Serbian government had begun progressively closing migrant shelters last October. German news agency KNA reported on August 6 on the closure last week of at least three reception centers at the borders with Croatia, Bulgaria, and Romania.
The government’s move to close the shelters is reported to be due to low occupancy related to fewer people transiting through the Balkans.
But Pezzutti contested this claim: “There may be less people along the Balkan route, but this is because the routes have changed.”
“People will find another strategy to move. People will not stop moving,” said Pezzutti, who also noted an increasing number of vehicular accidents related to the transport of people arriving irregularly into Serbia.