The tragic loss of life of a six-365 days-outmoded refugee in Serbia

The family of a six-365 days-outmoded Afghan refugee, who used to be hit by a transferring put together all over a pressured deportation, yelp Serbian authorities waited Four days to verify their younger relative’s loss of life and supplied them with honest Four bottles of water to blueprint Muslim funeral rites.

A freight put together struck Madina Husein on November 21 in Serbia discontinuance to the border city of Sid, after Croatian police pressured the family to come assist to Serbia.

Earlier, at spherical 6pm (17:00 GMT) that evening when temperatures had plummeted, police had found the family making an strive to hostile into Croatia in a impart to set Europe. They took them to a police role for questioning.

Madina’s mother, who used to be travelling with her other children as nicely, begged local officials to let them walk away in the morning on yarn of they were tired after strolling for hours.

But Croatian authorities refused this search files from of.

Croatian police took them to Serbia from town of Tovarnik and, at 8pm (19:00 GMT), suggested the family to walk along the put together line assist to Sid. Madina used to be killed on that fade.

The kid’s 15-365 days-outmoded brother found her physique metres from where she used to be hit.

« My mother used to be timid that my runt brothers and sisters would no longer be ready to idea where they were coming into into the night time, » Nilab Husein, Madina’s 17-365 days-outmoded sister, suggested Al Jazeera.

Speaking from a refugee centre in Principovac, she added: « When Madina used to be hit, and we found her physique, the officers who deported my family known as an ambulance.

« But my mother used to be no longer allowed to walk in the ambulance, even when she suggested the officers that she used to be exciting to walk away her [other] children to be with Madina. »

‘They wanted to conceal my sister‘s loss of life’

Croatia’s interior ministry confirmed the loss of life on its web utter, describing it as « regrettable » and denying that border police were to blame. The authorities has stated the family returned to Serbia voluntarily.

Croatian activists yelp the border recount is unlit, which ability the family used to be strolling at the hours of darkness.

In response to Doctors With out Borders (MSF), seven folks, in conjunction with three children, possess died on the Croatia-Serbia border in 2017 on the put together line between Tovarnik and Sid, both by transferring trains or electrocution.

After Madina used to be hit, the family used to be made to assist in a woodland for practically one hour. From there, Serbian police officers took them to Belgrade.

« My mother requested the Serbian police which sanatorium Madina used to be in, and they stated they didn’t know, » stated Nilab.

« They wanted to enact all the pieces in the assist of closed doorways and conceal that my sister’s loss of life took recount. The methodology they tackle refugees is esteem we have to no longer human. »

Serbian authorities took Four days to inform the family of Madina’s loss of life and didn’t enable the child to be buried in the capital, Belgrade, where they had hoped to retain a carrier with the Afghan refugee community.

The family also claims they got Four bottles of water to blueprint Muslim funeral rites, which possess washing the physique, and threatened them with deportation in the occasion that they refused to bury Madina in a Christian cemetery in Sid.

Madina Husein used to be one in every of 1000’s of refugee children in Serbia [Courtesy of the Husein family]

By the level of publishing, Serbian authorities officials had no longer answered to Al Jazeera’s search files from of for commentary.

An assist employee desirous about Madina’s case, who requested anonymity, suggested Al Jazeera that the Serbian authorities normally attempts to « quilt up its abuses to migrants ».

« There isn’t any longer a flexibility from authorities here in direction of refugees. They’re literally no longer treated esteem fellow humans who in this case are mourning, » he stated.

« Mourning is a direction of that wants the rituals, no longer on yarn of folks are being pigheaded, however on yarn of rituals give closure. »

Croatian police possess previously been accused of using violence to pressure migrants and refugees assist to Serbia.

In response to the UN, there are spherical 7,000 refugees for the time being in Serbia – spherical half of are children.

Migrants and asylum seekers possess stopped travelling throughout the so-known as Balkan route after Hungary and other countries closed their borders to migrants in March 2016.

1000’s were left stranded in Serbia, in conjunction with females and children, and are now uncovered to vulgar weather circumstances with the onset of iciness.