On the morning of October 20th, Khaled was jolted awake by loud shouts and screams from outside the dimly lit room he was sleeping in. The other men and boys sharing the room at the temporary living site near the Hungarian border began to get up to investigate the noise. Suddenly, the door was smashed open, revealing three masked men dressed all in black and brandishing batons. The men were members of the Serbian gendarmerie, a specialized branch of the military police. The officers shouted in Serbian and began to beat the men closest to the door with their batons.

**A door forced open by Serbian Gendarmerie officers during a violent eviction of a temporary living site in the Sombor area.**

Scenes like this play out with sickening regularity in Serbia and other Balkan countries. For Khaled, this particular police encounter was not his first one. The eighteen year old fled the war in Syria and has spent the last year attempting to get to Germany. From Syria, Khaled traveled to Turkey, then crossed over into Bulgaria on foot. He had been chased by Bulgarian border police while attempting to cross over into Serbia. A man he was traveling with had been caught and beaten. Eventually, Khaled found himself stuck in the north of Serbia, near the Hungarian border.

Khaled managed to escape the cramped room and began running towards the front door of the building, trying to reach a small iron gate that opens onto a dirt road. Two Serbian gendarmerie officers intercepted him as he ran and began beating him with their batons. Khaled fell to the ground and tried to shield his face, but the officers continued to beat him.

“I tried to run away, but they caught me near the front gate. They hit me very hard. They beat me when I fell on the ground. I was very scared”.

**Khaled sustained many injuries, including wounds and bruises to his face, eyes, head, arms and ribs.**

**Serbian gendarmerie carry assault rifles as well as heavy metal battens, marks from which can be seen on Khaled’s ribs.**

After the officers had finished beating him, Khaled was left lying in the dirt near the front gate. As they left, one officer kicked Khaled’s knee with a heavily booted foot while shouting at him in Serbian, before heading back towards the house. Khaled managed to get back on his feet and escape into the farm fields, where he hid until the police left four hours later.

Violent evictions like the one described in Khaled’s testimony to Collective Aid field reporters and volunteers are routine reminders of how difficult life is for people on the move in the Balkans. The evictions often take place late at night or very early in the morning, and affect both the physical safety of people on the move, as well as their psychological well being by creating an atmosphere of fear and uncertainty that interrupts daily life. During the same early morning police raid and eviction where Khaled was beaten in the Sombor area, many other people staying at the temporary living site reported similar treatment from the Serbian gendarmerie and police. When Collective Aid arrived at the site soon after the police had left, we witnessed first hand the aftermath of this common and violent occurrence.

According to testimony collected from several other Syrian men, the violence had started around 8 AM in the morning when four black jeeps with Serbian license plates smashed through the front gate. Fifteen heavily armed Serbian gendarmerie officers stormed the area, beating and detaining people who tried to flee into the surrounding fields. The officers entered the living areas of the buildings and began to rummage through people’s belongings. They flipped beds and mattresses, and threw clothes onto the ground. Suitcases were searched and their contents dumped out into piles on the floor, where any valuable items were either taken or destroyed.

**The destroyed front room of the temporary living site located in the Sombor area, near the Hungarian border.**

**A Syrian man cleans up his belongings after they were searched and dumped out onto the floor by Serbian police.**

**Suitcases and personal belongings, including a child’s coloring book and markers, after being searched by police.**

The Syrian men told us that the police also confiscated and systematically destroyed peoples cell phones. “They beat the young men, vandalize the house, break everything and break the phones”. This is a common tactic employed by border police in an attempt to hinder people’s access to information and cut off any contact they may have with their friends and loved ones abroad.

**Mobile phones destroyed by Serbian gendarmerie officers on the morning of the eviction.**

Outside the house, the gendarmerie rounded up those they had managed to detain and kept them from leaving with threats and physical violence. Around 50 people, mostly women and children, were forced into four large black police vans that were waiting on the dirt road just outside the front gate. They were driven off without the chance to collect their belongings from inside. While it is not known where they were taken to, the men who were left behind told us they thought they were being transported to Preševo in Southern Serbia, where there is a reception center for refugees.

Reports of human rights violations against asylum seekers, refugees and migrants at Europe’s external borders are so frequent that they hardly seem to register in the public eye for longer than a quick newscycle. European Union member states often silently tolerate or openly support new laws and policies that systematically strip human rights protections from people on the move, all the while preaching about tolerance and the importance of protecting the rights of refugees at home and abroad. Non EU member states such as Serbia receive massive influxes of money and equipment from the EU to strengthen Europe’s external borders. People on the move in Serbia, Croatia, Macedonia, Hungary and Bulgaria are routinely subjected to violence and inhumane treatment by law enforcement, as well as denial of access to asylum. People on the move are also routinely “pushed back” on their journeys. This term refers to the process of illegally forcing people back over a border immediately after they have crossed it, while denying them their legal right to claim asylum or seek protection. These tactics are strictly prohibited under international human rights law, and yet they are a common occurrence on Europe’s borders. Collective Aid, as a member of the Border Violence Monitoring Network has extensively documented these illegal and often violent pushbacks, compiling evidence of torture and degrading tactics used by Hungarian border forces and the Serbian police.

**Left image: Kurdish families at a temporary living site. Horgoš area, 10/24/2023. Right image: The same living site after a police eviction. Horgoš area. 11/01/2023**

**Left image: Temporary living site near the Hungarian border. 10/17/2023. Right image: The same living site after it was destroyed by police. 11/21/2023**

**Destroyed temporary living site near the Serbian-Hungarian border. 12/01/2023.**

The police raid and subsequent eviction where Khaled was beaten took place before the so-called “special military operation” that would be announced by Serbian Minister of the Interior Bratislav Gašić later in the month. However, violence against people on the move in Serbia is not tied to any particular announcement or police campaign. It remains ever constant, a systemic policy choice that is made possible by European Union funding and lack of action by international governing bodies. In Northern Serbia, the temporary living sites to whichCollective Aid and our partner organizations distribute essential items and services, are empty and have been mostly destroyed. The people who sought shelter in these areas have been forcibly taken to reception centers and official government camps around Serbia. The camps are massively overcrowded, with many people forced to sleep outside in the cold of winter. Basic necessities such as regular access to food, clean drinking water, medical care and the right to free movement are all absent in the reception centers and official camps at the moment.

Throughout history, humans have always migrated and moved from place to place. They have historically done so for reasons not dissimilar to the reasons that people move across borders today. Further criminalizing people’s right to free movement while denying them basic human rights won’t stop people from crossing borders to find safety.

Words and Photos by Josh Zimber

Everyday Violence at Europe’s External Borders: Violence and Inhumane Treatment as Part of Daily Life for People on the Move