Centre for Peace Studies

The Council of Europe's anti-torture committee has called on EU external border state Croatia to stop police ill-treatment of migrants and asylum seekers in its borders.

On Friday, its report called on authorities to take "determined action to stop migrants from being ill-treated by police officers and to ensure that cases of alleged ill-treatment are investigated effectively".

Rights advocates in Croatia have welcomed a European Court of Human Rights ruling on Thursday, that Croatia broke the European Convention on Human Rights in a case of a six-year-old Afghan child, Madina Hussiny, who was killed on November 21, 2017 when she was hit by a passing train close to the Serbian border.

Establishing the Croatian border-monitoring mechanism has turned into a litmus test for the EU in its attempt to build an effective, comprehensive, lasting and humanitarian solution to an increasing number of EU member states, including Greece and Romania as well as Croatia, using pushbacks to halt migration flows.

A human rights NGO, the Center for Peace Studies, filed a criminal complaint on Friday to the Croatian State Attorney's Office against "unknown perpetrators" from the police, "based on a reasonable doubt of degrading treatment and torture of 33 people and their violent, illegal expulsion from the territory of the Republic of Croatia to Bosnia and Herzegovina".

A Croatian NGO, the Centre for Peace Studies, CMS, on Friday said that the European Court of Human Right sent an inquiry to Croatia on Thursday, seeking an explanation on the case of a Turkish Kurd named Nurretin Oral.

Croatian NGOs working with migrants say they have seen no rise in the number of migrants entering the east of Croatia from Serbia, despite media claims of a massive influx and worries voiced by locals in the eastern border village of Nustar.

Delays in implementing a promised national plan for fighting discrimination mean Croatia may lose access to the EU's "Competition and Cohesion" program funds, as it is unlikely the plan can be adopted in time, an expert told BIRN.

Slovenia's decision to erect metal panels and other barriers on its border with Croatia, to tackle a potential surge in refugees, will increase people-smuggling and could lead to violence, Croatian experts have said.