A special Interpol operation HOTSPOT Adriatic 2023, organised by the General Secretariat of Interpol - the Counter-Terrorism Directorate and the Directorate for Coordination of Police Bodies of B&H, was carried out in our country from 13th to 17th November 2023; the aim of operation was to prevent and detect the movement of terrorists/foreign terrorist fighters and their associates who use irregular migration flows.
HOTSPOT concept was developed by the INTERPOL's Counter-Terrorism Directorate and in particular the Terrorist Networks Sub-Directorate with the aim of detecting, identifying and depriving of liberty of terrorists and their associated members who abuse illegal migration routes for illegal entry into different countries. The backbone of the concept is the cross-checking of biometric data, collected from suspicious persons, against biometric data in INTERPOL’s databases in real time on the spot.
Except of Bosnia and Herzegovina, such operational actions were carried out in Albania, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Serbia, the United Kingdom, Slovenia, Moldova, Italy, Libya and Tunisia.
During several months of pre-operative preparations, DCPB – NCB Interpol Sarajevo in cooperation with the INTERPOL General Secretariat conducted and coordinated all activities aimed at timely and successful realisation of this operation; in addition to the representatives of DCPB in this operation participated the representatives of SIPA, the Border Police of Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Service for Foreigner's Affairs, the Ministry of Interior of Una-Sana Canton and the Ministry of Interior of Sarajevo Canton.
Before the start of the operational action, the representatives of the INTERPOL General Secretariat carried out the professional training of the police officers in handling the most advanced sophisticated BIOSLED technical devices and thus enabled the successful and efficient conduction of the operation, i.e. the collection and cross-checking of migrants' biometric data on the spot, and provided all necessary professional, technical and other assistance to all members of the mobile teams on the ground throughout the operation.
During the operation, the Coordination Centre was formed in the Directorate for Coordination of the Police Bodies which, in addition to the DCPB representatives, also included the representatives of the law enforcement agencies of Bosnia and Herzegovina engaged in this operation; the cooperation and communication with the INTERPOL General Secretariat, the teams on the ground and the representatives of other agencies was carried out within this Coordination Centre.
The operational part of the HOTSPOT Adriatic 2023 special operation took place on the territory of the Una-Sana Canton in TRC Lipa, the Sarajevo Canton TRC Blažuj, as well as in Immigration centre in Istočno Sarajevo. According to available information in Bosnia and Herzegovina 292 persons were checked against INTERPOL Fingerprints and Facial Recognition Databases and 360 information were exchanged through INTERPOL secure system I-24/7 and other means of communication. During the crosscheck of biometric data, one person was identified as a person wanted under an international warrant for the criminal offence of organizing a criminal group and illegal trafficking of migrants, and was deprived of liberty and handed over to the further jurisdiction of the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
The results of this action are visible primarily through the activities undertaken for the purpose of combating the infiltration of potential terrorists into migrant groups residing in reception centres or outside them, as well as combating other forms of organized crime, increased checks of persons and personal documents against Interpol databases. The HOTSPOT Adriatic operational action is important for security in Bosnia and Herzegovina, but also for the countries of the region and beyond because of the control of the mobility of terrorists and foreign terrorist fighters in order to prevent their infiltration into migrant groups, pointing out the importance of Interpol tools and databases that are available to police authorities in B&H, achieved a high degree of cooperation, joint coordination and exchange of information between all participants of the action and the proactive fight against terrorism as well as other related criminal acts.
The Directorate for the Coordination of Police Bodies of Bosnia and Herzegovina would like to thank the INTERPOL General Secretariat for both the professional assistance and financial support in the realisation of this operational action, and uses the opportunity to thank all the police agencies in B&H that were active participants in the implementation of this operational action for their successful cooperation.