Justice minister concerned about rising migration through Balkans

Swiss Justice Minister Karin Keller-Sutter has been attending a regional conference on migration in the Bosnian capital Sarajevo, aimed at cooperation on irregular migration. Keystone / Fehim Demir

The numbers of refugees and migrants coming to Western Europe via the Balkans have again “risen sharply”, including to Switzerland, Justice Minister Karin Keller-Sutter said on Tuesday.

“People fly to Belgrade and come to Austria with smugglers via Hungary, and then continue their journey,” said the minister, who attended a ministerial conference on migration in Sarajevo on Tuesday. The Swiss government says the conference is aimed at “strengthening cooperation and extending support to the countries affected”, according to a press releaseExternal link.

While Switzerland is a transit country for many migrants, the numbers of asylum seekers have nevertheless risen again. By the end of August, 12,362 asylum applications were registered, according to the State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (SEM). The SEM has also corrected the expected asylum numbers from around 16,500 to 19,000 by the end of 2022.

The reasons for the increase are many, but since recently citizens from India, Cuba and Burundi no longer need a visa to travel to Serbia. It is unclear whether Russia, which is friendly with Serbia, is behind the trend as some eastern European countries assume, but the pattern is familiar according to Keller-Sutter. She referred to a wave of migrants through Russian ally Belarus to countries like Poland, in which Russia was suspected of involvement.

“It would therefore be desirable if the visa policies of the Balkan states were harmonized with those from the Schengen area,” the justice minister said. Several EU states are now planning an intervention with the EU Commission, in which Switzerland also wants to participate.