(30 Dec 2020) Hundreds of migrants boarded buses in Bosnia on Tuesday as they awaited relocation from the burnt-out Lipa camp to other facilities in the country.
Some 1,400 migrants lost shelter on 23 December when much of the temporary tent camp was destroyed in a fire.
The camp, near Bihac in the Krajina region, which borders Croatia, had already been slammed by international officials and aid groups as being inadequate for housing refugees and migrants.
The fire left the migrants stranded in squalid conditions, with no facilities or heat, and only meager food parcels provided by aid groups.
As snow continued to fall and winter temperatures dropped, Bosnian authorities organised some 20 buses to relocate the migrants on Tuesday, even though they did not actually have a new shelter to settle them.
The local authorities in Krajina have been blocking all the central government's efforts to shelter the migrants in an existing reception facility in Bihac.
Instead, the migrants were scheduled to stay onboard the buses overnight and authorities said they hoped to find a new location for them on Wednesday.
Bosnia has become a bottleneck for thousands of migrants hoping to reach western Europe.
Most are stuck in the Krajina region, as other areas in the ethnically divided nation have refused to accept them.
Several officials in the region insist they will not let Krajina become "a long-term" warehouse for the European Union's unwanted migrants.
They shut the reception facility last autumn, and demanding that other parts of the country step in and help out.
The EU has warned Bosnia that thousands of migrants face a freezing winter without shelter, and has urged the country’s bickering politicians to set aside their differences and take action.
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