Britain has announced further deals with Serbia, aimed at "smashing the gangs at the heart of the irregular migration crisis" and "securing UK borders ahead of hosting a major Western Balkans diplomatic summit this autumn," stated a press release from the UK government on April 2.

The additional deals come around five months after Keir Starmer already announced more cooperation with countries in the region, and on top of deals signed between the former Conservative government and Serbia, last in May 2024, but previously in 2021 and 2022, which included allowing for "quicker removals to Serbia" and initiatives designed to "protect the UK’s borders and communities."

Britain’s Foreign Secretary (Foreign Minister) David Lammy will be signing the deals during his visit to the region this week. During the visit, Lammy also intends to hear "directly from female survivors of human trafficking."

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Information sharing to combat organized immigration crime

According to the UK government press release, almost 22,000 people were recorded as using the Western Balkans route to transit into Europe last year. Some of those people travel through Europe towards the Channel coast with the hope of reaching the UK.

The UK government aims to "tackle the problem at every step of the people smuggling journey, working with neighboring countries to combine resources and share intelligence and tactics."

The latest deals will allow Serbia and Britain to "share information more quickly and directly to combat and disrupt organized immigration crime."

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Has crackdown in Serbia moved the routes elsewhere?

Interestingly, a report published on April 2 on the news and investigative regional platform Balkan Insight, looking into the alleged growth of an armed Afghan gang operating in the Western Balkans, quotes an unnamed Pakistani smuggler who says that the route has largely transferred to Bosnia, since things became much tougher for smugglers in Serbia.

According to BIRN, Serbian police launched a large-scale operation in the summer of 2023 to dismantle armed smuggling gangs, who were reportedly waging turf wars on Serbia’s border with Hungary, and at that point, much of the trade and those involved moved to Serbia.

Britain has been sending drone and camera technology to the Western Balkans, to help authorities there detect drugs and weapons concealed in vehicles, as well as track popular smuggling routes and try and prevent people from "dangerously and illegally crossing borders."

Many of the border areas in the region still contain mines, following the conflicts in the 1990s, when the former Yugoslavia broke up.

A recent study from the Mixed Migration Centre, based in Geneva, also found that just cracking down on a smuggling route didn't necessarily stop the trade entirely; it just moved it to somewhere else, or encouraged smuggling gangs to become "more agile and flexible," and even more "professional."

BIRN and NGOs working with migrants in the region have also frequently printed allegations from migrants that they suffer beatings and violence at the hands of some of the authorities, but also, according to Wednesday’s BIRN report, at the hands of armed gangs, like an Afghan gang known as BWK, which is alleged to be operating kidnap for ransom operations as the classic smuggling routes have dried up, or are less lucrative.

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More money promised to tackle problems

Ahead of the visit, Lammy said: "Criminal gangs have long exploited instability in the Western Balkans, parts of which have become a major transit route for irregular migration and serious organized crime. They are risking lives for profit and becoming increasingly violent in their determination to make as much money as possible."

Lammy added that in the context of the world becoming "more dangerous and unpredictable, the Western Balkans is of critical importance to the UK and Europe’s collective security, and the UK remains committed to building resilience and stability in the region."

The Foreign Secretary said that "external actors -- including Russia -- seek to exploit this fragility by fanning ethnic tensions, destabilizing democracies and threatening the hard-won peace and stability."

At the Organized Immigration Crime summit in London, held earlier this week, the UK government announced funding of 30 million pounds (around 36 million euros) "to tackle supply chains, illicit finances and trafficking routes and an additional three million (about 3.5 million euros) to enable the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) to increase its capacity to prosecute organized international smugglers."

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'Countering Russian and other malign influence'

Britain hopes to use its expertise to "strengthen the resilience of institutions" in the Western Balkans "against Russian and other malign influence – countering the threats of cyber-attacks, disinformation and interference in elections to stand up for freedom and democracy."

The UK, stated the government press release, has maintained a presence in the region via its participation in NATO’s KFOR mission that has been present in Kosovo since 1999.

In February, Labour announced the appointment of Karen Pierce as a special envoy to the Western Balkans. Pierce, who will take up the role in spring, and will be taking over from Lord Peach who held the position before her.

At that time, a UK government press release said that Britain had already agreed new deals "to increase operational cooperation on organized immigration crime with countries including North Macedonia, Serbia and Kosovo."

A summit is due to be hosted in London in autumn this year to address key regional issues, including irregular migration. The UK will host the conference in partnership with Germany.

Read Also Serbia: Criticism over government closure of refugee shelters along Balkan Route

Series of agreements aimed at stopping migration

These initiatives come off the back of other agreements the UK has signed with Tunisia for instance, also aimed at stopping migration further back up the route than the Channel coast. In January, the UK government also announced a sanctions regime aimed at taking down "people smuggling rings and starving them of illicit finance, fueling their operations."

Opposition politicians, like the Greens’ Co-leader Carla Denyer, have criticized the Labour government, pointing out that they are "failing to provide safe and legal routes into the UK.” Her comment came after Labour produced a leaflet saying it had delivered the "four biggest deportation flights in UK history," and had deported more migrants than the previous Conservative government.

Denyer added that "any claim the Labour Party may once have had to be a party of compassion or principle has well and truly gone," reported the Press Association.

Labour stated that it made "no apologies for taking decisive action to secure our borders." The government says that their returns and removals rate has hit the highest rate Britain has seen in the last eight years.

However, in the first three months of the year, more people crossed the Channel on small boats to the UK than in the first three months of 2024, which was still under the Conservative administration.