ZAGREB, June 22 (Xinhua) -- Three people were critically injured and nine slightly injured after a van carrying illegal migrants lost control on a Croatian highway on Friday, Croatian national television reported.
The accident happened on Friday morning at the motorway between Rijeka and Zagreb. There were 12 passengers in the van, and according to unofficial reports, they are all Syrian citizens. The van was registered in Italy, while the driver is from Hungary.
Croatian police are investigating from where the van entered the country and who the smugglers are. Police said the driver lost control of the vehicle because of high speed. All passengers were transported to a nearest hospital in Rijeka.
Police also stated that a Croatian citizen was arrested on Thursday evening while illegally transporting 14 Afghan migrants.
Croatia was on the so-called Balkan route in 2015 and 2016 when hundreds of thousands of migrants flowed from Greece via Macedonia, Serbia, Croatia and Slovenia into Austria and further north in the EU. There is fear that the route has been active again.
Croatian weekly Globus reported on June 15 that in the first three months this year, Croatian police caught 1,371 people trying to illegally cross the border. That is 70 percent more over the same period last year. According to the police, most of them are from Afghanistan and Pakistan.