Republika Srpska (RS) is fully prepared to respond to any danger and it won't accept international donations for the construction of migrant shelters on its territory, said Darko Culum, the chief of police in Bosnia's semi-autonomous entity.

Following a meeting of a coordination body to monitor the movement of illegal migrants in RS, Culum said the competent agencies in this entity discovered 946 illegal migrants since the beginning of the year in four of its towns near the northern Bosnia's border.

All of the discovered migrants were sent to the Foreigners’ Affairs Service and the Border Police except those who expressed a wish to apply for asylum.

“The RS police is closely following the movement of migrants and we're not allowing them to move around without the police surveillance in order to protect the personal and property safety of citizens. The problem is that migrants are uninterruptedly reaching Bosnia and Herzegovina, which is the westernmost point on their way to the European Union,” said Culum.

In an attempt to get closer to their final destinations, most of the migrants took to Bosnia's northwest, the Una-Sana region bordering Croatia. But, Croatia did not let them in, as the larger part of the migrants are illegal and posses no valid documents proving their origin.

International organisations helped Bosnian authorities to prepare mostly abandoned or rarely used facilities at seven locations across the country to accommodate migrants who got stuck in Bosnia on their way to western Europe. All shelters are located in Bosnia's second entity, the Federation (FBiH).

“A great part of them wants to go out of Bosnia and Herzegovina but they cannot cross (the border) because police do not allow them so,” said Culum warning that a strong influx of migrants in the upcoming period might jeopardise the security in the country.

Particularly concerning is the fact, he added, that some of them can be linked to terrorism and terrorist activities.

“There are five, six persons that can be linked to terrorism and terrorist activities and there are 26 in the Una-Sana Canton who can be connected with combat operations in Syria,” he added.

Bosnia's authorities have been struggling with the migrant issue for the whole past year, after dozens of thousands of foreign nationals, coming from various Asian and African countries took to Bosnia, a route to their final destinations in European Union.

Due to weather conditions, the influx of migrants to Bosnia significantly decreased over the winter season and a little more than 1,000 were registered after entering the country since the beginning of the year. Some 4,000 migrants are currently accommodated in Bosnia, in seven shelters – of which most are located in the northwestern Una-Sana region, the region bordering Croatia.