Bosnia and Herzegovina Issues - 2021

GEOGRAPHICAL NAMES 

Disputes - international

Serbia delimited about half of the boundary with Bosnia and Herzegovina, but sections along the Drina River remain in dispute

Refugees and internally displaced persons

refugees (country of origin): 5,116 (Croatia) (2019)

IDPs: 99,000 (Bosnian Croats, Serbs, and Bosniaks displaced by inter-ethnic violence, human rights violations, and armed conflict during the 1992-95 war) (2020)

stateless persons: 66 (2020)

note: 80,500 estimated refugee and migrant arrivals (January 2015-July 2021)

Illicit drugs

increasingly a transit point for heroin being trafficked to Western Europe; minor transit point for marijuana; remains highly vulnerable to money-laundering activity given a primarily cash-based and unregulated economy, weak law enforcement, and instances of corruption

Trafficking in persons

current situation: human traffickers exploit domestic and foreign victims in Bosnia and Herzegovina and Bosnians and Herzegovinians abroad; Bosnian and foreign women and girls are sex trafficked within the country; Bosnians are also exploited through forced labor in construction and other industries in neighboring Balkan countries and throughout Europe; thousands of migrants and refugees smuggled through Bosnia and Herzegovina are vulnerable to trafficking, especially women and unaccompanied minors; Romani children are victims of forced begging, sex trafficking, and domestic servitude

tier rating: Tier 2 Watch List — Bosnia and Herzegovina does not fully meet the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking but is making significant efforts to do so; because the government devoted sufficient resources to a written plan that, if implemented, would constitute significant efforts to meet minimum standards, Bosnia and Herzegovina was granted a waiver from being downgraded to Tier 3; the government adopted a national strategy in January 2020; the State Prosecutor’s Office appointed a prosecutor to the anti-trafficking strike force, the only mechanism to coordinate law enforcement efforts across entities on trafficking cases; the government identified more trafficking victims and revised the structure and guidelines of regional coordinating teams to increase effectiveness; however, the lack of an approved state budget delayed funding for anti-trafficking efforts; law enforcement continued to regularly investigate trafficking under lesser offenses, while judges continued to issue sentences below the minimum penalty; the government continued to penalize victims and did not disburse annual funds to NGOs for victim protection (2020)

NOTE: The information regarding Bosnia and Herzegovina on this page is re-published from the 2021 World Fact Book of the United States Central Intelligence Agency and other sources. No claims are made regarding the accuracy of Bosnia and Herzegovina 2021 information contained here. All suggestions for corrections of any errors about Bosnia and Herzegovina 2021 should be addressed to the CIA or the source cited on each page.