Conducting the visa liberalization agreement

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Conducting thevisa liberalization agreement

• by
• General Nenad Banovic
• Head of the Border Police Directorate

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Measures taken in order to maintain the
visa-free travel regime with the EU

• The Government, on March 7th 2013, established
  the Commission for Monitoring the Visa-free
  Travel Regime with the EU for a new two-year term
  of office
• The measures taken by the Government, the MoI and
  the Commission have produced good results.

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Results

• The provisions related to a new criminal offence
  "Facilitating the abuse of the right to asylum in
  a foreign country" became applicable as defined
  in Article 350a which resulted in 9 criminal
  charges filed against 11 persons
• Criminal Police Directorate of the MoI has
  maximised its operative work in order to collect
  data and findings on persons who seek asylum in
  the EU member states and intensified checks in
  passenger transport companies and agencies
  providing organised transport of passengers to
  the EU member states
• The MoT intensified control of permits issued to
  carriers in international road transport and
  penalised those carriers who had irregularities
  in their work it also submitted to the MoI a
  Review of the restrictions regarding vehicles and
  conditions
• The carriers in international road transport with
  passenger transport permits have been controlled
  on several occasions across the Serbia.

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Results

• Criminal Police and Border Police prevented the
  departure of groups of Serbian citizens who
  organised themselves and tried to leave the
  country in order to seek asylum in the EU
• Readmission cooperation is rather fruitful - more
  than 95 of readmission applications were
  approved
• Commissariat for Refugees and Migration has
  implemented a series of activities aimed at
  providing assistance to the institutions at both
  central and municipal levels - the Commissariat
  staff held 35 workshops on reintegration of
  returnees under readmission agreements into
  receiving communities for the members of local
  services, a database of returnees' needs has been
  created, while 7,000 Information Booklets for
  returnees under readmission agreements have been
  developed and distributed,
• The Commissariat for Refugees and Migration
  drafted and proposed measures for further
  implementation of Strategy for Reintegration of
  Returnees.

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Strategy measures

• To intensify informing of potential returnees and
  asylum seekers about the consequences of
  irregular stay in the EU, and about opportunities
  to achieve their rights in Serbia, which are most
  often cited as a reason for asylum
• To increase the employment measures for returnees
  under the readmission agreements
• Centers for Social Work, in cooperation with
  other agencies of local authorities, should
  immediately recognize the needs of returnees and
  they should, according to the territory of their
  jurisdiction, take necessary measures with regard
  to the improvement of housing conditions,
  involvement in health and social care and
  education system, and in particular they should
  take care about urgent needs for the provision of
  basic living conditions.

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Strategy measures

• To intensify work with local authorities on whose
  territories the largest number of returnees is
  situated and to continue with the revision of
  local action plans in order to include returnees
  and to provide basic means at the local level for
  planning assistance
• To work on further capacity building of the
  Council for the migration of those local
  authorities who reviewed LAP, primarily by
  financing activities provided by these plans
• To establish coordination with Team for the
  Implementation of the Strategy for Improving the
  Situation of Roma and the Social Inclusion and
  Poverty Reduction, and Roma coordinators
• To continue cooperation with authorities in
  countries that return the greatest number of
  persons and to inform them about the rights of
  citizens of Serbia and possibilities and ways to
  achieve them
• To consider the possibilities of developing
  programs and reaching bilateral agreements with
  EU countries that would create the conditions for
  temporary and seasonal employment of low-skilled
  workers from Serbia.

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Additional activities

• The media campaign was dedicated to the
  protection of rights of all migrants
• the Commissariat developed posters and fliers
  entitled "I don't want to seek asylum in the EU
• 3000 flyers named "false asylum seekers are
  risking everything" were distributed at border
  crossings
• The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic
  of Serbia monitors and analyses the issue of
  bogus asylum seekers on a daily basis through its
  diplomatic and consular offices.

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Final recommendations

• Based on present practices and experiences and
  bilateral contacts with the representatives of
  the countries where this issue is most
  pronounced, Serbian competent authorities
  expressed their opinion on how to mitigate this
  problem to some degree by recommending the
  following measures
• To reduce or abolish welfare benefits for asylum
  seekers
• To shorten the asylum procedure
• To place Serbia on the list of "safe third
  countries"
• In case the unfounded asylum application is
  rejected, the applicant should be banned to
  re-enter the EU countries for a certain period of
  time.

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Comparative data for 2010, 2011, 2012 and 2013
Countries 2010 2011 2012 2013
FR Germany 4978 4579 8477 11272
Sweden 6255 2699 2691 1669
Luxembourg 141 932 358 61
Belgium 1233 1109 571 346
Switzerland 910 1217 1889 303
Denmark 391
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Statistics provided by diplomatic missions and
consular posts in 2012
Countries Jan. Feb. March April May June July Aug. Sept. Oct. Nov. Dec. Total
FR Germany 697 399 308 148 143 199 324 496 1395 2673 1306 302 8477
Sweden 196 218 204 142 137 139 148 239 358 520 211 179 2691
Luxem-bourg 91 34 39 42 39 20 25 26 16 24 2 - 358
Belgium 58 45 36 58 33 65 58 45 64 52 32 25 571
Switzer-land 315 190 153 97 99 111 187 410 200 61 34 32 1889
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Statistics provided by diplomatic missions and
consular posts in 2013
Countries Jan. Feb. March April May June July Aug. Sept. Oct. Nov. Dec. Total
FR Germany 424 398 385 482 400 525 960 1170 1593 1553 1769 1613 11272
Sweden 141 107 94 121 109 119 172 130 158 165 154 199 1669
Luxembourg 7 7 2 1 3 2 8 2 4 13 12 - 61
Belgium 30 30 30 40 23 27 37 28 29 27 17 28 346
Switzerland 30 23 30 34 13 34 16 29 42 17 20 15 303
Denmark 132 103 77 16 15 11 3 2 3 10 5 14 391
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