The fire that broke out at the Lipa migrant camp in northwestern Bosnia, which is being shut down on Wednesday, has still not been extinguished and the migrants who were staying there have no idea where they will spend the night.
The blaze has already destroyed most of the tents and hundreds of migrants are currently standing in a field nearby without any options for shelter.
Kamp Lipa @N1infoSA pic.twitter.com/4cXCc9vyKw
— Andjelka Markovic (@andjelkam707) December 23, 2020
The camp was initially set to close down last weekend but the closure was postponed several times, as the country’s state-level authorities were expected to find a solution to accommodate some 1,200 migrants who stayed there.
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Migrants staying at Lipa had no access to electricity, running water or sewage. The camp also provided no adequate protection against winter weather conditions.
Although Bosnia's government, formally the Council of Ministers, officially approved on Monday the forming of the temporary migrant camp ‘Lipa’, which would consist of adapted shipping containers able to house 1,500 migrants in the Bihac area, the IOM said the potential works in the camp cannot be conducted while the migrants are still there.
The migrants told N1 they would like to go to the Bira camp, which was closed in late September due to pressure from locals since it is located in central area of the town of Bihac.
Locals strongly oppose the potential reopening of the Bira camp and said they would block the transfer of migrants there.
