SARAJEVO, Bosnia-Herzegovina
Police arrested 243 migrants from Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan over two days, Serbia’s Interior Ministry announced on Wednesday.
In one incident on Tuesday, 137 Afghans, 26 Syrians, 19 Pakistanis and 3 Iraqis were arrested at a railway station in a southern city of Nis for entering Serbia illegally.
Separately, two suspected people smugglers were arrested in capital Belgrade alongside 41 Syrian and 17 Iraqi refugees.
The suspects, identified as J.M. and M.M., are being held on suspicion of immigration offenses and human trafficking, the ministry said.
Since the beginning of the year, more than 9,000 refugees have sought asylum in Serbia, which is on the “Balkans route” from Asia and Africa to western Europe.
According to official Serbian statistics, 5,000 people registered for asylum in 2013 and nearly 16,500 last year.
