Reception conditions in asylum centres across the region meet minimum reception standards in principle. However, the conditions need to be further strengthened to ensure that asylum-seekers have better accommodation, access to health services, psychosocial support, education, recreational, and sport activities.
UNHCR in Bosnia and Herzegovina will continue to support work of two existing centres. Where necessary, primary health care will be covered. In Serbia, UNHCR and the Government conducted a joint assessment of the Centres against international standards in summer 2016, with the aim to take stock of the protection situation as well as accommodation capacities. Findings of the assessment will serve as a basis for continued support to establishment of adequate reception facilities while promoting and facilitating the transition from temporary structures towards more sustainable and durable solutions. This support will include rehabilitation of the existing asylum centres in central Serbia and infrastructural upgrades, as well as ensuring adequate access to registration, health, psychosocial services and others.
Law on Asylum in Kosovo (S/RES/1244(1999)) already pays specific attention to the treatment of and care for asylum-seekers with specific needs.
Montenegro is concerned that once (if) its reception capacities become fully occupied, the alternative accommodation facilities, will need to undergo major improvements to reach the minimum required standards. In the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia a risk of detention of asylum-seekers is growing in the context of high number of arrivals. Such practices started in 2016 with arbitrary detention of asylum-seekers in the Temporary Transit Centre Vinojug, outside of existing legal framework. UNHCR will step up monitoring and advocacy to mitigate that risk, including through insisting on full implementation of procedural safeguards related to detention, as part of the revision of the Law on Asylum and Temporary Protection, due in 2017.
2017