On 23 June, the GDP was invited to speak at a Collective Aid webinar, “Immigration Detention: From Global Trends to Bosnia and Herzegovina.”
Presenting their latest research report examining conditions within Bosnia and Herzegovina‘s Lukavica Detention Centre, Collective Aid’s Advocacy Manager Anna Gruber highlighted serious deficiencies in the centre, including degrading living conditions, a near-total absence of independent monitoring, arbitrary detention, and serious barriers to legal remedies.
Bosnia’s immigration detention policies and practices, however, do not stand in isolation–something both the GDP’s Executive Director Michael Flynn and Refugee Advocacy Coordinator Aziz Muhamat highlighted in their presentations during the event. As Michael Flynn noted:
“Although Collective Aid’s new report about Bosnia’s Lukavica Detention Centre focuses attention on a single detention facility, the operations of the Lukavica Detention Centre nevertheless reflect broader, global trends as more and more countries increase their use of arbitrary immigration detention measures, often with assistance and under pressure from wealthier neighbouring countries.”
Discussing the global spread of immigration detention, Flynn highlighted how European and U.S. migration externalisation policies have exported and entrenched detention practices far beyond their own borders. He also explored the fundamental characteristics of immigration detention that shape its purpose and enable its abuse. Charting a path forwards, he urged participants to:
- “Work tirelessly to bring harmful practices to light and to reveal the inherent arbitrariness of immigration detention,”
- “Develop evidence that can be used to mobilize protections that extend beyond local jurisdictions, focusing on universal human rights norms and drawing global attention to local problems,” and to
- “Empower those who have lived through immigration detention to document it, report it, and be the leading voices for change.”
Drawing on his own experience of prolonged detention at the Manus Island Offshore Processing Facility, the GDP’s Refugee Advocacy Coordinator Abdelaziz Muhamat reflected on the striking parallels between the conditions he endured and those documented at Bosnia’s Lukavica Detention Centre. Despite the vast geographical distance between the two facilities, he described a shared reality of isolation, uncertainty, and the profound psychological harm inflicted by immigration detention. “Whilst Lukavica and Manus are geographically extremely different,” he observed, “there is much that is strikingly similar about detention in these places.”
[Webinar recording coming soon…]
