The respondent of this testimony is a 27 year old afghan male who attempted to cross the Serbia-Croatian border outside of Šid at around 11:00 pm on the 15th December 2020. The male was waiting inside the back of a wagon in a commercial truck for several hours leading up to the pushback.

Two minutes after crossing the border, the vehicle was stopped by Croatian Border police, where the police used an X-ray scanner identifying the respondent and three other males. One police officer ordered the group to step out of the wagon for identification.

Once stepping out of the vehicle the respondent remembers the officers asking the group where they were from, he replies “Afghanistan”. The respondent stresses how he could not describe the police officer because “when we look at police they beat us, the officer says “look down!”….so we looked down”. The officer then asks where they came from, he replies “Serbia, Šid”, they then hand over their belongings and camp cards to the officer.

The respondent recalled after twenty minutes, the officer instructing the respondent to “bring everything and come”,  they then entered a room roughly three metres away from where they were apprehended. All four males had their pictures taken by the police inside the building in complete silence.

Shortly after the police officer gave back the respondent’s belongings; the group were taken into a police van and driven to the Šid border,  where they were ordered to walk back to Šid.