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“They got us out of the van one person at a time, each time somebody was released, the officers would hit them with batons. It was ten officers to one person. They hit one of my friends until his arm came out of place.”

Date & Time 2024-10-10
Location Exact location unknown, around Velika Kladuša
Reported by Collective Aid
Coordinates 45.209240539783, 15.795855771875
Pushback from Croatia
Pushback to Bosnia
Taken to a police station yes
Minors involved yes
WLTI* involved no
Men involved yes
Age unknown
Group size 18
Countries of origin Afghanistan
Treatment at police station or other place of detention detention, denial of food/water
Overall number of policemen and policewomen involved 14
Violence used beating (with batons/hands/other), kicking, pushing people to the ground, electric shock, threatening with guns, destruction of personal belongings, theft of personal belongings, Degrading transport conditions.
Police involved 4 Croatian police officers in dark blue uniform, 1 white police van with a stripe; 10 Croatian police officers in dark blue uniform, 1 white police van with police written on the side.

The respondent is an Afghan man in his 20s. He was part of a transit group made up of 18 people between the ages of 16 and 30 (“there were 2-3 kids under the age of 18”, the respondent explained), all from Afghanistan. Although the respondent could not remember the exact date of the pushback, he explained that it had occurred approximately one month ago (making it the 4th October). This was the first of the group’s three attempts to cross from Bosnia to Croatia.

The respondent explained that they had crossed the Sava around 1-12 pm. Though there was a bridge close by, “you can’t use the bridge, because there are police stationed on both sides”; this meant that the transit group had to cross via water instead. Upon arrival in Croatia, the transit group walked through water for 2 nights and 1 day: “at the time there was a lot of water, as there had been flooding”, the respondent explained, which made the journey especially treacherous and slow. Eventually, they arrived at a train line approximately 15km away from their river-crossing point. Before they could get on the train to Zagreb, they were apprehended by 4 Croatian police officers in dark blue uniforms; the respondent suggested that they might have been spotted on cameras as they were apprehended as soon as they arrived. The respondent described the police vehicle as a white van that had a stripe on the side. The respondent could not identify what was written on the van, though he recalled that it did not say “police”, and that the back of the van was completely closed off, with no windows.

The respondent reported that the Croatian officers “told us to stop”, and threatened them with their weapons: “They showed us their guns and tasers”. “Before even searching or interrogating us, the officers threw us all onto the ground and began kicking us”, the respondent explained. The respondent reported that the officers kicked everyone, including the minors, before instructing them to get into a line. The respondent recalled how one officer went down the line, punching and frisking each person, demanding money and phones, and breaking those phones. “They even took the food that we had kept in our bags, and they did not allow us to eat. They threw it all away”, the respondent added. Once everything had been confiscated (including “approximately 50 to 100 euros from each person), thrown away, or destroyed, the officer finally asked the transit group where they were from. “We are from Afghanistan”, they replied. The respondent reported that the officers proceeded to throw “all 18 of us” into the back of their van: “the back of the van was completely closed off; it had no windows and no ventilation”, the respondent recalled. From there, they were driven for approximately 2 hours to a detention center in an unknown location, where they were held for two nights, “without water, without bread”. The respondent did not know where they had been taken as there were no windows in the van and he no longer had a phone. In detention, “they gave us nothing”, the respondent reported: “they did not let us eat”.

After two nights in detention, the transit group were driven for approximately 8 hours in another white police van, which the respondent identified as having police in Croatian written on its side. “In the morning, they dropped us off at a land border with Bosnia”, the respondent recalled, somewhere in the direction of Velika Kladusa. The group were surrounded by 10 Croatian police officers in dark blue uniforms, with 5 officers stationed on each side of the van, boxing them in. The respondent reported that “they got us out of the van one person at a time”: each time somebody was released, the officers would hit them with batons, “ten officers to one person”, until they fled across the border into Bosnia. “They hit one of my friends until his arm came out of place”, the respondent reported. The respondent himself described being struck twice on the back. “The officers [in dark blue] were really cruel. They treated us with a lot of violence”, the respondent explained.

The respondent explained that, from there, they were made to walk on foot, into and across Bosnia. They had no phones or money, but managed to follow the road. “With a lot of difficulty, we got ourselves to Velika Kladusa”, the respondent explained, where they managed to get enough money to get tickets back to the camp in Sarajevo. ”The Bosnian people really helped us”, said the respondent.