International Organization for Migration (IOM) Mission in Ukraine

The world's leading inter-governmental organisation dealing with migration has warned in a document released on Wednesday that the COVID-19 panic is adding to existing strains between host communities and migrants in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

After locals in the town of Bihac in northwest Bosnia protested against plans to relocate migrants and refugees from the torched Lipa camp to the Bira centre, inside the town, Bosnia ordered its armed forces to set up new tents in the Lipa camp where the migrants can stay until the winter adaptation of the camp is completed.

About 1,000 migrants and refugees who have lingered at the site of the burned camp will now over-winter in what was formerly the largest migrant centre in Bosnia.

The decision concludes a several-day search for solutions to the emergency situation that arose after migrants torched the Lipa camp as it was about to close.

The troubled Lipa migrant and refugee camp near Bihac in northwest Bosnia was set on fire on Wednesday as it was due to close.

The camp has been at the centre of a battle between the local authorities and the International Organization for Migration, IOM, which has long threatened to close the camp if the authorities do not improve winter conditions.

After ignoring warnings for months that the Lipa migrant tent camp in northwest Bosnia is not adequate for hosting people over winter, the government of Bosnia, the Council of Ministers, on Monday agreed to convert it into an official "container camp for the accommodation for 1,500 migrants".

The International Organization for Migration, IOM, has acted on warnings that it would close a migrant camp, saying Bosnian authorities had ignored its repeated appeals to help supply basic services.

The International Organization for Migration, IOM, has warned that it will cease to provide services at the Lipa camp for migrants and refugees by Wednesday if authorities in Bosnia and Herzegovina continue to fail to meet their commitments.

A total of 150 people in an accommodation facility in the town of Kranidi, in southern Greece, have tested positive for the new coronavirus, Deputy Civil Protection Minister Nikos Hardalias told jousnalists after visiting the site on Tuesday.

Hardalias said 148 of these are refugees, one is an employee, and one is an aid worker. All patients are asymptomatic, he said.

A dozen unaccompanied refugee and migrant minors were flown from Greece to Luxembourg on Wednesday as part of a European Union initiative to expedite the relocation of some 1,600 over the next few months to EU member-states.

The Greek government is planning stricter controls on how migrants slated for deportation come and go from two camps that are currently in quarantine due to coronavirus outbreaks.