|
|
| |
|
Refugees
and Internally Displaced Persons in
Serbia |
Republic of Serbia is one of
six countries in the world and the only one
in Europe with a
long-lasting refugee situation, with
more than 86,000 refugees on its territory,
after more than sixteen years
after the wars in
Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina
had ended.
In addition, more than 200,000 former
refugees who have been formally integrated
into Serbia obtaining citizenship, have not
resolved their problems such as housing and
employment.
As for the number of internally displaced
persons (IDPs), according to the
Commissariat for Refugees and UNHCR, based
on census of IDPs conducted
in 2000,
about 187,000 Serbs and members of other
non-Albanian communities were forced to
leave Kosovo and Metohija (KM).
After that, an additional 20,000 displaced
persons fled from KM.
In 2008,
around 210,000 IDPs were registered in
Serbia, excluding Kosovo territory.
The total number of internally displaced in
Serbia reached 305,000 persons.
Of these, around 4,200 people are still
living in 43 collective centers.
More than half of all
refugees in Serbia had found
a refuge in Vojvodina,
northern Serbian province.
According to UNHCR in
2002
there were 166,000 refugees and
12,500 displaced persons from Kosovo and
Metohija living in Vojvodina.
The number of officially registered refugees
is continually
decreasing, so in 2010,
according to official data of the
Commissariat for Refugees of Serbia,
41,684 people have refugee status, and
12,252 people have an
internally displaced person's
status.
|
Acquisition of citizenship of Serbia does not
make a daily life
more easy for
former refugees. Poor
economic and unstable political situation has
contributed to that there are still many
refugees who want to
stay in Serbia, but that
fail to achieve a sustainable livelihood for
their families. Problems faced by the most
vulnerable persons from this target group, have
not changed in comparison to
the previous period - the high level of
poverty is present among
all, housing and employment
issues continue to be viewed as priority.
The largest number of
beneficiaries with refugee
status, without
qualification and without permanent employment,
occasionally engage in seasonal
agricultural work,
sometimes craft, or
sell goods
at the market. A number
of users was able to sell
their property in Croatia
and purchase
a rural household, but
the housing conditions are
usually modest. It happens that the
houses they bought are
barely inhabitable, and they have no means
for adaptation. The
process of return and reconstruction of
destroyed property, especially in Croatia,
remains to be very slow.
The creation of safe conditions for the return
of displaced persons to
Kosovo are not yet in sight. Among the displaced
people, there is a large
percentage of Roma, who often live in
isolated settlements with bad
living conditions.
In Vojvodina, there are still two collective
centers in the municipality of Pancevo and Kovin,
in which more than 200 refugees and internally
displaced persons reside.
Photo: Refugee children in front of
the collective refugee center 'Cardak',
Cortanovci, which
was
severely damaged in a fire a few months
after this photo was taken. The refugees were
moved to other collective centers in Serbia. |
|
|
|
Network
of Mobile Teams for Extremely Vulnerable Refugees |
|
Project
donor:
UNHCR |
|
Coordinator:
Csilla Stojanovic, psychologist |
|
Psychosocial
Counseling Center: Trg mladenaca 6, Novi Sad |
|
Tel.:
(021) 6621-140 |
| |
|
Since April 2000 NSHC has
been implementing this project in
Vojvodina, with aim
to provide psychosocial assistance and
support to
particularly vulnerable refugees and
displaced persons, and to establish and
develop municipal networks of social and
humanitarian services for refugees.
There are 15
associates, psychologists and social
workers, engaged in
provision of psychosocial support
services, information and advocacy in the
field. They operate in
municipalities with
greater number of refugees (29
municipalities).
In Novi Sad, these services are provided in
the psycho-social counseling
centre at Trg mladenaca 6 / I,
Novi Sad. |
|
|
Among users of NSHC's mobile
teams refugees that assumed
the status of a citizen
prevail. It is common to meet
"mixed" families, where most members have the
citizenship, while one or two
people still have
a refugee status.
Besides that, there are
children who were born after the exile, as well as
spouses of internally
displaced persons or refugees.
More and more persons who have not been
the beneficiaries of
the project applz for assistance to
our associates. This indicates a general
trend of declining standard of living, where people
who have so far managed to
struggle for
existence, no longer have the capacity
to do so by themselves.
Associates in the field
have recognized the most
serious problems in the following
types of families:
- Senior households located in villages
with extremely inadequate
housing, often with incomplete process of obtaining
documentation, so their chances of achieving social
rights are reduced to a minimum.
Although they are socialy
vulnerable, they are
not willing to change the environment and
move to homes
for the elderly;
-
Families with children are faced with
lack of funds to bare the costs of
further education of their
children;
- Families who have purchased
squalid old houses are in
great need of building materials for renovation;
- Those who are able to work
have difficulty finding a job
particularly in small, rural areas. This
population is not entitled to social security, given
the preserved ability to work. They
provide for their families through work on
the black market and eventually, by engaging in
self-employment programs, where such programs are
implemented.
As part of psychological
support staff from the mobile teams talk to
beneficiaries about potential
opportunities to address their situation and
motivate them in this respect to take the necessary
steps, providing advisory assistance for
reproductive health and family planning and the
like. In addition to providing psychosocial support,
the project staff informs
them about
current assistance programs
and connect them with
other organizations and institutions, and often
engage in obtaining documents and other benefits and
subsidies, material assistance, as well as filling
in various applications, and the like.
NSHC has established good
cooperation with local offices
of the Commissariat for Refugees, the
municipal offices of the Red Cross, Centers for
Social Welfare, representatives of municipalities,
as well as international and national NGOs.
In 2010 the
staff of the mobile teams participated in 45 local
coordination meetings, and there were 1,002
individual personal contacts. Cooperation is
satisfactory in all municipalities, and in some
municipalities, members of the MTs
are members of various commissions and committees
that deal with refugees and internally displaced
persons. |
|
In
Central and Southern Serbia this project has been
implemented by three local NGOs: ''Amity-snaga
prijateljstva'' from Belgrade, ''Sigma Plus''
from Nis and ''Horizonti'' from Cacak.
|
|
Top
of the page |
|
|
|
|
|
Development
of Local Economy for Sustainable Return and
Reintegration |
|
As
partner organizations,
NSHC and
Serbian Democratic Forum (SDF) from Pakrac, Croatia,
implemented a one-year project
in 2006 named
’’Development
of Local Economy for Sustainable Return and
Reintegration’’.
Following
the years
of experience and know-how in implementation of
return program and community
revitalization
of war-affected areas in Croatia, SDF realized that
the main obstacle for sustainable return of refugees
and displaced people is economic insecurity and lack
of employment opportunities. Through this
project SDF and NSHC are going to support
development of economy-oriented programs in
municipalities of
Okučani,
Stara Gradiška
and
Gornji Bogićevci
in Western Slavonia,
and therefore promote sustainable return and
reintegration in Croatia.
For
the past fifteen years, rural areas of Republic of
Croatia have suffered huge changes in economy,
especially in a view of ownership and posing family
farms into entirely new economic and legal frames,
in accordance with EU standards. War-affected areas
lack opportunities for employment and expansion of
medium and small-sized enterprises, which aggrevates
return and sustainability of returnees. An average
family farm in Croatia has 2,9 hectares of land and
lacks adequate capacities for quality production.
Farm producers do not know how to solve this problem
and often they even do not think about starting a
production.
Within this project, at least 20 family farms
in
municipalities of
Okučani, Stara Gradiška
and
Gornji Bogićevci
(Western Slavonia)
organized production based on contemporary market
principles. Farm owners, returnees, were
introduced with opportunities and rights on
provision of funds by the state in the process of
joining to EU (premiums and subventions), which
should expand their productions and ensure existence
for all family farm members. They were also given
an opportunity to gain know-how and skills on planning,
organizing and managing a family farm, and know-how
on technologies in plant and cattle production. They
were given professional advice in the process of
registering family business and business plan
development. Family farms will become members of a
Cooperative, which will reduce costs of production,
purposely organize production, ensure selling of
their products and funds for further investments,
provide expert assistance, guidance and joint
approach at market. Returnees will also be offered
to join re-qualification program in order to gain
necessary skills for employment.
Local authorities and community representatives in
all the mentioned municipalities have been
introduced to project activities in order for the multisector cooperation to be established. This
kind of approach should contribute to a long-term
benefit for the entire local community. The project
was financed by
the Royal Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs. |
|
Top
of the page
|
|
|
|
Novi
Sad Initiative - Road Signs to Durable Solutions |
| Within
the NGO Transition and Development Programme
in Serbia, sponsored by the FRESTA and implemented
by the Danish Refugee Council, NSHC has been
implementing the Novi Sad Initiative project and the
Road Signs
to Durable Solutions project from 2001 to 2004. The
overall aim of these projects was to support
refugees and IDPs in Vojvodina
in finding
sustainable durable solutions, repatriation in the
country of their origin or local integration in
Serbia. NSHC
was part of this programme
together
with five local NGOs: Group 484, IAN, Serbian
Democratic Forum, Hi Neighbour and Protecta.
Our basic
activity was provision of informative support to
beneficiaries and to representatives of local
communities in Vojvodina. Info-Center was open in
Novi Sad where refugees and IPDs could get all the
needed information related to return and local
integration possibilities. The same information was
delivered to refugees in collective centers. In
cooperation with NGOs 'Društvo za toleranciju' from
Bačka Palanka and 'Regionalni odbor za pomoć
izbjeglicama Vojvodine' from Novi Sad, NSHC
published articles on the subject of durable
solutions in
the
'Tolerancija' bulletin. We organized public tribunes
on the subject of
return
and local integration.
An
important part of our activities was regional
collaboration with NGOs from Bosnia and Croatia,
which resulted in organizing Regional Conference on
Durable Solutions in May 2003.
The
Conference's Conclusions and
Recommendations
>>>
Considering the fact that
most of the
refugees (60-70%) intend to stay in Serbia, the main
precondition for their successful local integration
is economic sustainability. In order to facilitate
discussion on this issue and improve knowledge about
this, we organized lectures on Small and
Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs) in 20 municipalities
in Vojvodina. Representatives of refugee and
domicile population, as well as the representatives
of local authorities, attended these lectures. The
lecturer was Mr.Miroslav Vasin, Deputy Secretary of
the Vojvodinian Secretariat for Labor, Employment
and Gender Equality.
More about
SMEs >>> |
|
Top
of the page
|
|
|
|
|
NOVI SAD
HUMANITARIAN CENTER 2004 - 2011 |
| |
|
Anal