Chapter 3: The Experiences and Well-being of Child Refugees from the Yugoslavian War in Exile in Czechoslovakia

This chapter deals with a less explored historical period during the war in former Yugoslavia. It will trace the experiences of child refugees from Croatia in the fall of 1991, detailing their stay in the Czech and Slovak Federal Republics and the conditions surrounding their return to their homeland in February 1992. Children initially thought they would only stay away for 2 weeks, but this trip lasted much longer than expected. This chapter analyzes qualitative interviews conducted between 2023 and 2024 with 19 former child refugees. Refugees are defined, in line with the 1951 Refugee Convention, as those, owing to well-founded fear of persecution, unable or unwilling to return to the country from which they fled (UNHCR, 1951). Child refugees are particularly vulnerable among the wider refugee population (UNHCR, 2024). War conflicts are indiscriminate in nature, putting everyone in the affected area at risk of violence, injury, or death, regardless of their political views, religion, or ethnicity – the typical reasons for persecution. The inherent instability of war refugees’ status, which always includes vulnerable individuals, has prompted responses like the European Union’s adoption of directives to stabilize the situation for those fleeing conflict. These directives establish a legal framework for protection, particularly in the aftermath of the Yugoslav Wars, and include directives on temporary protection (Council of the European Union, 2001) and subsidiary protection (Council of the European Union, 2011).