You may know of the Calais Jungle – it’s time you heard about Bosnia’s Jungle too
Less than 25 years ago, the people of Bosnia were living in conflict. Now home to thousands of people who have fled conflict and poverty in their own countries, Bosnia is heading for a humanitarian catastrophe that no one is talking about.
Walking into the Vučjak migrant camp, which lies on Bosnia’s north-west border with Croatia, it’s hard to know what to feel most shocked about. The diarrhoea covering the floor outside the tents? The signs warning of landmines just a few feet away? The hundreds of people sleeping on filthy mud – six people huddling under one blanket?
The migrants living here call it a jungle and it is. Everyone spoke about the Calais Jungle, but Bosnia’s Jungle is unheard of, perhaps because it’s that little bit further from our own doorstep. But the crisis here is real, I have seen it and it’s only getting worse.
Walking through the camp I hear the same sentence repeatedly, ‘this is no place for animals, let alone humans’.
The sense of desperation is overwhelming – people are literally begging for help, most without proper shoes or warm coats and the majority barely surviving on just one small meal a day. One young man told me that he thought nothing could be as bad as his life in Afghanistan, but then he came to Vučjak.
There are no toilets, no running water, no electricity, no medical services, and as winter approaches bears and wolves are making their way down from the surrounding mountains into the valley where the camp has been steadily growing for the past four months.
No one wants to live here, but official UN camps in the area are full.
In the past few days Vučjak has seen a massive influx of people, growing from housing about 700 people to 2,000 people in just 48 hours. But the size of the camp itself has not grown – stretching its borders risks moving even closer to landmines. The ‘dining room’ has been dismantled to accommodate more sleeping bodies on the floor, but many are being forced to sleep outside in freezing temperatures.
The Red Cross, driven purely by its humanitarian mandate to help the most vulnerable people, is the only organisation currently providing any assistance in Vučjak. Other organisations have refused to enter because the conditions are so inhumane and inappropriate for any human to exist.
Since the camp was established in June, our local volunteers have been providing two meals a day to its residents. But the sudden influx of people has diminished supplies and forced us to cut back our support to just one meal a day. Migrants are halving their meals to share with the new arrivals – a sight that is both heart-breaking and uplifting all at once.
Not only is this camp pushing the thousands of people living here to breaking point, but it is exhausting the volunteers working here and presenting them with one of the most challenging decisions they have ever faced.
Do they push themselves to breaking point and continue to work as the only actor in such a challenging environment, or do they pull out of the camp and hope it forces authorities to find a better alternative?
This is the agonising decision our teams are trying to make right now.
While we don’t know what the future holds for people in Vučjak, what we do know is that they will not survive there much longer. Winter is coming and a safe alternative to Vučjak must be found to save lives and prevent a humanitarian catastrophe.
To support the British Red Cross to help more refugees and migrants across Bosnia and Herzegovina, donate to the charity’s Global Refugee Fund.
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