Today we are sharing BVMN’s submission to the un Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of racism, xenophobia and related intolerance for the report on Race, Borders, and Digital Technologies.
The use of technology in pushback practices has only contributed to the ease in which these racist and repressive procedures are carried out against people-on-the-move in the Balkans. Devices like drones, thermal imaging cameras, and vehicle scanners have been weaponised against people-on-the-move, making them easier to detect and thus compounding their vulnerability and the dangers they face. With the support from network member’s No Name Kitchen, Info Kolpa and other anonymous partners, BVMN submitted this report to the Special Rapporteur last year, where it is now being hosted.
This report provides an overview of different cases which BVMN have collected over the last years in which the use of EU-funded security technology was deployed by Croatian authorities either immediately preceding or during an illegal pushbacks. Links to the full incident reports are included for each case study. The case studies are categorized into several different sections: drones, helicopters, scanners for vehicle detection, and thermal/night vision. Each section is complemented by an overview of the technological framework in which this equipment has been acquired and deployed by the Croatian Ministry of the Interior