On Tuesday the 29th of December 2020, a group of 25 people left Bihac, with ranging ages, the respondent being 17 years old. The respondent described that the group of 25 walked for three days, before being apprehended by Croatian police forces. However, him and one friend managed to escape this apprehension attempt and continued their way to Slovenia, having little knowledge of what happened to the 23 others, nor where they were apprehended.
Since the respondent stated that he did not have a mobile phone with GPS during this time, he could only estimate where they split from the group. He remembered being around 2 to 3 km away from the D23/E71 road intersection (where it crosses with 71 road), south of the Croatian town of Josipdol. The respondent and his friend continued for 12 more days into Slovenia, before reportedly being apprehended by the Slovenian authorities, approximately 12 kilometers south-east of the intersection of the A1 and E61 highways in Kozina (Slovenia).
When apprehended by the two police officers on patrol (by car), the respondent and his friend waited 30 minutes for four more officers to arrive and were taken to a nearby police station. Given the proximity, it is likely that they were taken to the station in Kozina [45.609524, 13.938186].
There, the respondent described to have had a close room interview with multiple questions being asked, the most memorable was the following: “How many people were in your group”, to which the respondent replied just him and his friend. The respondent reported that he was slapped in the face by the hand of one police officer during this interview, since the officer apparently did not believe this answer. The officer repeated this question several times and reportedly kept slapping the respondent when giving the same answer. This process was repeated 3-4 times before the officer stopped.
When responding to the question on whether the respondent expressed his desire to ask asylum, his response was the following: yes I said “give me stay”.
He stated that his finger prints were recorded in this police station, as well as shoes, coats, bag, etc (which were reportedly not returned afterwards). After the interview, they got taken to another “place” and there they had to give their mobiles and money (also reported not returned). From this second “place”, the officers described as and presumed to be Slovenian authorities subsequently drove the 17-year-old and his friend to the Slovenian border with Croatia and reportedly handed them over to what the respondent described as Croatian authorities. These officers in turn drove them across the country to the border with BiH , in the area surrounding the city of Velika Kladusa. There, the respondent and his friend were reportedly unloaded from the vehicle and told to walk When asked about the time of the pushback into Bosnia and Herzegovina, the respondent stated that it was around midnight.
After this, they had to walk back to Bihac, without shoes and coats and they arrived in the morning of the 14th of January in the city centre of Bihac. The respondent mentioned that this was only his most recent “game” and he could give us more information about the 6 earlier “games” he had attempted, all reported as having the same result of a pushback.