In December 2020, the Serbian Constitutional Court ruled, that Serbian border control officers unlawfully deported a group of Afghan refugees from Serbia to Bulgaria in February 2017 and violated their rights. The court ordered Serbian authorities to pay the 17 members of the group, who brought the lawsuit, 1,000 Euro (each) in compensation.
The Serbian border police brought them back to the Serbian-Bulgarian border in the middle of the night below-freezing temperatures. Afterwards the group felt that it had no choice and returned to Bulgaria, where they came from a day earlier. To the group of Afghan refugees where also children were belonging.
After the Push-Back to Bulgaria some of the refugees stayed there in camps for some days, before some of them made it it back to Serbia again and moved on towards Western Europe. The documentation of the Push-Back was done by lawyers and the group was represented by the lawyer Nikola Kovacevic in front of the Serbian court.