Meet our members

BVMN works via a horizontal network of member groups. The members are NGOs, coo-ops, collectives and grassroots initiatives spread across South East Europe. Members sit on an open assemby, and each contribute to various different working groups within BVMN, such as:

Collection of Pushback Testimonies: No Name Kitchen, Collective Aid, Re:Ports Sarajevo, Josoor, and Fresh Response.
Advocacy and Media: Are You Syrious, Centre for Peace Studies, Info Kolpa, Mobile Info Team and Mare Liberum .
Faciliation and Administration: Rigardu (a German-based NGO whish forms the legal frame for the Network)

Alphabetic description of members

Are You Syrious?

Are You Syrious? (AYS), is a grassroots civil society organisation, which aims to provide trusted international refugee news via the AYS Daily Digest; research and advocacy on asylum and migration in Croatia and on the EU level, as well as innovative integration and educational programs in Zagreb, Croatia.

Centre for Peace Studies

Centre for Peace Studies (CPS) from Croatia has expertise in migration, asylum and integration, racism and xenophobia, and socio-economical inequalities. Since 2017, CPS has been actively warning about the issue of pushbacks and violence at Croatian borders with Serbia and Bosnia- Herzegovina, as well as taken up related strategic litigations. CPS also directly provides legal aid to persons seeking international protection, persons who received international protection, immigrants and persons who were discriminated against on the grounds of race, ethnicity and religion.

Collective Aid

Collective Aid is an independent, volunteer-run organisation aiming to respond to the ever changing needs of refugees and migrants across Europe. Working in Serbia, France, and Bosnia and Herzegovina, we currently run projects focusing on water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH); non-food aid distributions; and border violence monitoring.

Disinfaux Collective

Disinfaux is a not-for-profit research collective based in Greece. We conduct in-depth investigations on human and environmental rights issues, borders and surveillance, detention/exclusion regimes, migration/displacement, and alt-right/far-right movements. We operate as an autonomous network of on-the-ground researchers, academics, and journalists, interested in open-source investigations, field research, and investigative journalism. Our goal is to contribute to the work of human rights defenders, including public advocacy stakeholders, organizations and legal bodies, on the national and international level, and to produce investigations that provide supporting material for court cases related to human rights violations. We adopt an interdisciplinary approach to our investigations by employing sophisticated methodologies for data archiving, indexing and analysis of open data and audiovisual material, and 3D modeling as a tool for the analysis, recording and representation of space. We are members of national and international human rights monitoring networks and collaborate with research groups, academic scholars, media outlets, freelance journalists, and legal/civil society actors, thus providing an interdisciplinary perspective to our investigations.

Fresh Response

Fresh Response is a grassroots civil society organisation founded in northern Serbia in July 2016 and re-activated in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina in November 2019. Its aims have been to quickly respond and flexibly help fill emergency gaps for People on the Move when there’s been a scarcity of other engaged actors, in partnership with in strategic partnership with local organisations. Currently its focus is on facilitating ophthalmologist exams and eyeglasses through local clinics, as well as highlighting pushback cases with strong potential for strategic litigation — starting from frameworks and partnerships formed since late 2016 at the Hungarian-Serbian border.

Info Kolpa

Infokolpa is a civil society organisation based in Ljubljana, Slovenia. It engages with issues of migration, asylum procedures and freedom of movement. Infokolpa tracks and investigates the production of legality and illegality practices on the Balkan route focusing on violation of human rights on the Schengen and externalised borders of Europe. As an informal group, Infokolpa is performing activities towards the disclosure of violence on the borders, “silent topics” outsourced to Europe’s periphery, and improvement of integration in “incoming” society once refugees overcome physical, material, communicative, bureaucratic and psycho-social barriers to a peaceful life. Infokolpa’s membership is vast combining a wide array of people from various professional backgrounds and different status, from locals to people waiting for international protection, people with refugee status as well as people who were betrayed by the European Common Asylum System. Radio Študent, one of the oldest and independent media society in Europe and Gmajna cultural association, are also the members of Infokolpa.

Josoor

Josoor (“bridge” in Arabic) has been supporting victims of pushbacks and other refugees in need of assistance in Turkey since March 2020 whilst monitoring human rights violations across the EU – Turkey borders, both on Evros and the Aegean Sea. Through cooperation with BVMN as well as with international media and investigative research networks, Josoor aims to raise awareness about the human rights violations occurring daily on the EU-Turkey borders and advocate for solidarity and sustainable, humane solutions.

Mare Liberum

Mare Liberum monitors human rights in the Aegean. With our ship we are present off the coast of the Greek island of Lesvos. As an independent observer, Mare Liberum conducts research to document the current situation at the European border. The basic idea is to influence the situation in the sea by being present and make the authorities be aware that civil society is present.

Mobile Info Team

The Mobile Info Team (MIT) aspires to support individuals caught in a complex European asylum system in Greece. MIT provides refugees with accurate and up-to-date information on Facebook in their native languages. MIT caseworkers assist individuals personally for the full duration of their asylum procedure and family reunification. It also organizes Info Session to keep asylum seekers and other volunteers on the ground informed. Advocacy is an important tool to advocate structural reform in the asylum procedure and to report about human rights violations, such as push-backs.

No Name Kitchen

No Name Kitchen (NNK) is a grassroots organization providing support to people-on-the-move in border towns along the Balkan Route. We provide direct assistance (through the distribution of food and NFIs), medical support, and collect the testimonies of individuals returning from border crossings attempts with stories of violence and abuse from authorities along the EU’s external borders. It is our goal is to support all human beings on their right to seek for a better future. No Name Kitchen is a founding member of the Border Violence Monitoring Network.

[RE:]ports SARAJEVO

[RE:]ports SARAJEVO supports people in transit in Sarajevo. Re:ports Sarajevo documents their situation and illegal pushbacks throughout the „Balkanroute“ with focus on the Bosnian-Croatian border.

Rigardu

Rigardu began as a group of volunteers providing direct humanitarian assistance in 2015 turning into a charitable association based in Germany a year later. Nowadays, the group’s main focuses are on political education and strengthening Border Violence Monitoring Network (BVMN) of which its forms the legal and administrative framework.