15

from Croatia to Bosnia,

The main respondent is a 33-year-old man from Iraq. He reports that on Tuesday the 7th of May 2024, he was apprehended with 3 other people at the Croatian village of Staro Selo Topusko (Topusko) and was pushed back to the Bosnian town of Podvidska (Velika Kladuša). The group was composed by 2 Moroccans nationals and 2 Iraq nationals, all men between 25 and 33 years old. The group left with a taxi from Bihac at nighttime at 7 p.m. on Monday the 6th of May. From Bihac they drove for 1 hours and 20 minutes to Glinica (Velika Kladuša). The group started walking at 8.30 p.m. and walked for one hour until they arrived at the border. They crossed the river Glina that marks the border with Croatia and continued walking for 5 kilometres. They slept for some time on the ground in the forest and started walking again at 5 a.m. Then they arrived at the town Staro Selo Topusko, where a neighbour came out of the house with a gun and two dogs.
The neighbour said that he was a trained police officer. He said that he was going to call the police and threatened them with his gun. He told the group, in an aggressive loud tone, to wait there. The respondent tried to explain to the policeman that they were afraid and would like to move on. The neighbour replied that he was afraid for his family and therefore wanted to call the police and that the police would sort out the situation and then everything would be fine. The responded asked why the man was afraid of him. The policeman had his dogs follow the group until 30 min later the police arrived. The respondent described the police vehicles as two white vans, with police written on the side, one from the brand Renault and one from Volkswagen. He could identify them after seeing the image galleries as being prisoner transport van. The respondent described all of the 3 policemen as wearing blue uniforms with the Croatian flag on the upper sleeve. One with a tube scarf in front of his mouth and nose and another one with an ear plug radio. He could identify them after seeing the image galleries as being the uniform of the Croatian Border Police. The police came in the morning at around 8 a.m. The first policeman with an ear plug radio came in a van and told them to stop and wait. They had to handover their backpacks and cell phones. The policeman told the respondent to open his phone without giving a reason. The responded asked if the police could take his fingerprints because he wanted to apply for asylum in Croatia. But the police just stayed in the car and ignored his question about asylum. After 30 min the second white van arrived with 2 policemen inside. After they arrived, they came out of the car and the 2 policeman started to beat the group. The police beat the responded on his back, foot, hand. They just ignored the respondent attempts to calm the situation. The police brought them into the van. The ride was around 1 hour long until they arrived at the river Glina, which marks the border between Croatia and Bosnia close to the town Crni Potok. The police let them out of the car and destroyed the cameras of their mobile phones in front of them. They gave them back their phones and told them to leave it inside their pockets. The police started beating one person with the stick and then another person in the group. The police threw first two of them into the river and some minutes later another person of the group. The police threw their backpacks and belongings after them. They had to walk for 10 metres through the river until they reached the other side of the bank. The police said: “this is Bosnia, go, go, go!” While the group waded through the water, the policemen started throwing stones at them. One person in the group wanted to return to the river to save his cell phone from the river, whereupon a policeman took out his gun and threatened the person with his gun.
The group had to walk back from the border until they met a man at 11 a.m. at his garden who drove them back to Bihac in his car. They arrived in Bihac at around 1.30 p.m.