Four Balkan states shut their borders to economic migrants

Four states along Europe's Balkan refugee corridor shut their borders on Nov. 19 to those not coming from war-torn countries such as Syria, Afghanistan or Iraq, leaving thousands of others seeking a better life in Europe stranded at border crossings.

The overnight decision was exactly the domino effect that both asylum-seekers and European nations had feared would happen given the record number of people fleeing to Europe this year and new fears after the deadly Paris attacks of possible militants coming in with refugees.

The U.N. refugee agency says three Balkan countries shut their borders overnight to migrants from nations that are not directly engulfed in war.

Macedonia was not allowing in from Greece people from Morocco, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Liberia, Congo or Pakistan, the UNHCR spokeswoman in Serbia, Melita Sunjic, said on Nov. 19. Slovenia also said it has closed its border for the so-called economic migrants, while the Slovenian Defense Ministry said it planned to call up about 200 of a total of 914 army reservists to help control the influx.

On the Serbian border with Macedonia, the Serbs were only letting in migrants from Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq. And on the Croatia-Serbia border, Croats were only accepting people from those three countries plus Palestine, she said.

Serbia has turned back to Macedonia some 200 migrants and Macedonia has not let them in, she said. "So they are stuck on a no man's land," she told The Associated Press.

Croatia's Interior Minister Ranko Ostojic said the country has refused to take back 162 people, who were rejected by neighboring Slovenia as economic migrants.

Ostojic said on Nov. 19 that Croatia also will no longer allow in migrants from war-free countries who wish...