In a new report that Save the Children has produced, 48 children and young people aged 13-19 are interviewed about their flight to Europe.
All 48 children say they have been exposed to violence during their flight, which confirms previous warnings from international organizations that violence is extremely present on these types of routes, and perhaps more widespread than previously thought, says Sofia Rönnow Pessah, Policy Adviser on Migration at Save the Children's European office.
Save from smugglers and beat by the border police
The most common type of violence is carried out by border police, but human smugglers and their helpers also take advantage of the children, who often have to rely on these adults, says Sofia Rönnow Pessah.
Children describe how they have been stripped naked, forced to stand in the cold, given electric shocks and beaten with sticks, resulting in injuries.
"We were arrested by the police.
They told us to sit down, and we sat down.
Then they selected two of the group and beat them," says a 16-year-old boy in the report.
"When the children hiss, or when they don't listen (to the smugglers), he just hits and hits," says another 13-year-old child about a smuggler.
Many boys do not dare to talk about sexual abuse
In the report, there are several children who testify about sexual abuse.
However, the subject is taboo - not a single one of the children says they have been victimized themselves, but almost two-thirds have seen someone else being victimized on at least one occasion.
Many are also used as child labor in countries where they stay for a long time, such as in Turkey after the refugee agreement with the EU in 2016.
The report compiled by Save the Children was conducted in Bosnia-Herzegovina and in Serbia, in collaboration with the University of Sarajevo, and used in-depth interviews with the children interviewed over a three-month period at the end of 2021. On average, the children and young people had been on the run for four years.