The impact of COVID – 19 on North Macedonia policy for migration and asylum – the story behind the scenes

Kosevaliska, Olga (2021) The impact of COVID – 19 on North Macedonia policy for migration and asylum – the story behind the scenes. In: EU Borders, Migratory Routes and Internal-External Security in the Time of Sanitary Crisis, 19.03.2021, University of Salerno, Italy.

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Abstract

In response to the outbreak of COVID-19 and for the purpose to prevent high numbers of infected of COVID-19, the President of North Macedonia announced state of emergency form the middle of March until to June. Restrictive measures were introduced to protect citizens and prevent pandemics (e.g. strict hours of curfew during working days and complete lock downs during weekends and holidays, restriction of non-essential movement or gatherings, postponement of court proceedings and transition to online education, closure of all borders crossing points including air traffic on the whole national territory etc.). Despite the deep impact that these restrictions had upon the local population, they heavily impacted upon migrants and asylum seekers residing in transit centers or refugee facilities, but also, upon migrants and asylum seekers who were trying to find their way through the Balkan route to reach Europe. For example, the ones that were within the country suffered health restrictions, tightening rules regarding freedom of movement, limiting access to asylum procedures and access to adequate accommodation; while the others that were trying to cross the county irregularly suffered illegal pushbacks and border violence practices. Since the outbreak of the pandemic and the declaring the state of emergency, the Transit Centers (TC) of the southern and norther border were rearranged. The TC on the southern border was rearranged into a camp where the migrants are quarantined, before being transferred to the Center for the Reception of Asylum Seekers and Temporary Protection in Vizbegovo, Skopje, and the TC on the Northern Border was reorganized into a shelter camp for short stay before deportation to Greece and or Serbia, if an entry from the northern border was confirmed. Given the information in all the reports from the government, the relevant international organizations, and NGO’s, in the Transit center for illegal migrants – Vinojug on the Southern border, the number of illegal crossings in the second half of 2020, had been increasing rapidly and on a daily basis on average firstly had doubled to a hundred, and in the following period it increased to 1300 migrants per day. For this reason, with government decision, a state of crisis was declared on a part of the territory - in the areas of the southern and northern border. This was due to urgent need to control and manage the entry and transit of migrants throughout the territory of North Macedonia. In this context, we’ll give an effort to present North Macedonia policy responses towards migrants and refugees after the outbreak of COVID-19, to give a short insight of the situation and the respecting of human rights in the TC, also to show the statistics for 2020 for the migrants crossing on the territory of North Macedonia, especially in the period of the closure of all border crossing points and to emphasize the main point - since the border points were close, the smuggling business became even more profitable and the price for smuggling went sky-high to approximately to 800 - 1000 euros per person per border crossing point.
Key words: COVID-19, migration, smuggling, human rights, asylum.

Item Type:	Conference or Workshop Item (Lecture)
Subjects:	Social Sciences > Law
Divisions:	Faculty of Law
Depositing User:	Olga Kosevaliska
Date Deposited:	25 Jan 2022 09:23
Last Modified:	25 Jan 2022 09:23
URI:	https://eprints.ugd.edu.mk/id/eprint/27976

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