Committee Chairperson Dr Vesna Rakonjac said that the objective of the sitting is to brief the Committee members on the current situation in the field so that the Committee could react within its purview. The Committee is also ready to learn about the crisis points in the field and ask the Ministry of Public Administration and Local Self-Government to set up field teams in the local self-governments, especially in view of the coming winter and the expected rise in migrant numbers, said Rakonjac.

Representative of the Commissariat for Refugees and Migration Ivan Gerginov presented the Commissariat’s history and work to the Committee, housing capacities of the shelters and the current situation in the field. He said that the institute of asylum is often abused, because Serbia is not the final destination for most of the migrants. The rising numbers of migrants and asylum-seekers recorded by June of this year prompted the Government to set up a Working Group to follow the migration trends and work on a response to the challenge, said Gerginov. About a thousand people cross the border with Macedonia every day, and the centre in Presevo receives 700-800 people who are mostly bound for the border with Hungary, and not the shelters. So far, 37,931 people declared asylum intentions, 3,121 of which are minors, for the most part unaccompanied.

Ljubinka Mitrovic of UNHCR said that, according to the data provided by the Ministry of Interior, since the beginning of 2015, 54 thousand people said they intended to request asylum in Serbia. She opined that 95% of them are refugees considering that they come from Syria, Afghanistan and Somalia, countries generating the most refugees. She reaffirmed UNHCR’s readiness to assist Serbia in profiling these persons and establishing whether they are migrants or asylum-seekers, as well as in setting up a functional asylum system in accordance with international standards. The organisation is helping the national institutions to respond to the refugees’ humanitarian needs, added Mitrovic.

State Secretary at the Ministry of Labour, Employment, Veteran and Social Affairs Nenad Ivanisevic and Nikola Kovacevic of the Belgrade Centre for Human Rights spoke about the situation in the field, the migrants’ problems and the authorities’ response to their rising numbers.

In the ensuing debate, the officials exchanged views on the situation in the coming months with their dire weather conditions, the situation caused by Hungary’s decision to build a wall along the border with Serbia, vulnerability of unaccompanied minor asylum-seekers, situation in Belgrade, Subotica and Kanjiza and possible opening of triage centres for migrants, need to pass a migration policy, draft a new law on asylum, as well as the relevant authorities’ future activities, considering that, according to estimates, the wave of migrants will not diminish by the end of the year.

At the end of the sitting, the Committee members decided to visit Subotica on 24 July and to have bi-monthly Committee sittings on the topic.

The sitting was chaired by Dr Vesna Rakonjac, Committee Chairperson.