In the European Union, pressure is growing on Serbia to tighten its looser entry requirements for other countries. At the meeting of EU interior ministers in Luxembourg on Friday, numerous states blamed this practice for the sharp increase in the influx of migrants via the Western Balkans route. “Serbia must adapt its visa practice to the EU,” demanded Federal Minister of the Interior Nancy Faeser (SPD). This has to happen “not sometime, but now”. EU Home Affairs Commissioner Ylva Johansson said the Commission would urge all Western Balkan partners to end visa-free entry for third countries. She specifically did not rule out suspending the visa agreement with Serbia, which grants the country’s citizens free entry to the EU.
Serbia has signed agreements with dozens of countries for visa-free entry and stays of thirty or ninety days in recent years. These include a total of 25 states that do not enjoy such a status in the EU. In the past few months, thousands of people from Turkey, India, Burundi and Tunisia have been picked up in EU countries who had previously come through the Belgrade hub. As a rule, they have no prospect of asylum. According to the EU border protection agency Frontex, the number of illegal border crossings on the Western Balkans route doubled in the first nine months of this year compared to the same period last year to 106,000. This number is not the same as persons; often those apprehended make several attempts to cross a border.
Vučić wants to change visa practice by the end of the year
Faeser complained that Serbia’s visa practice was based on “which states do not recognize Kosovo”. That is “unacceptable”. When asked what means of pressure the EU had against Belgrade, the minister said twice that “they want to become a candidate for accession” and therefore have to adapt their visa practice to the EU. In fact, Serbia has been an EU accession candidate for ten years, and negotiations have been going on since the beginning of 2014, albeit sluggishly.
Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić said last week, after talks with Commission President Ursula von der Leyen in Prague, that his country would change visa practices “by the end of the year”. However, confidence in this promise is low. Czech Interior Minister Vít Rakušan, currently the council’s leader, announced a trip to Belgrade on Friday to urge swift changes. Interior Commissioner Johannsson, on the other hand, promised to deploy more Frontex officers to better control the EU’s external borders. However, Member States must help with this, she said. The Czech Republic and Austria have controlled the border with Slovakia since the end of September because of the strong influx.
Frontex officers are also tasked with ensuring that all migrants are properly registered if apprehended in an EU country. This applies above all to Greece and Italy, the most important arrival countries on the Mediterranean. “There is no longer any registration at the external borders,” complained Luxembourg Foreign Minister Jean Asselborn, who is also responsible for migration. Syrians arrive in his country who have not been recorded anywhere, “as if they had parachuted down”. The Federal Police, who are currently recording 400 illegal entries a day, are also complaining about this problem. EU countries are obliged to register migrants in the country of first entry and store their fingerprints in the Eurodac database. This is the only way to later determine which country is responsible for an asylum application.
