The UN High Commissioner for Migrants (UNHCR) and the EU co-operate with MasterCard to provide illegal migrants with pre-paid credit cards to finance their journey to Europe. This is reported by the Slovenian news provider Nova24.
No ID is required to receive such a credit card, and the card bears the logos of both the UNHCR and the EU. The name stated on the cards is UNHCR.
The information from the Slovenian net based newspaper is from a source in the Croatian police. Many migrants that have received such cards are said to be in Croatia and in Bosnia-Herzegovina. There, they prepare themselves to continue their northward journey.
According to the Croatian police the migrants are well equipped, with good shoes, wearable clothes suited for hiking, smart phones, and even weapons. The source in the police emphasises, however, that not all migrants have such cards.
In 2016, MasterCard declared that credit cards were being produced to «provide refugees with movability, flexibility, and dignity». In a press release last year, MasterCard also revealed that they had begun co-operation with the radical immigration enthusiast and multi millionaire, George Soros. This co-operation was named «Humanity Ventures», and is aimed at «catalysing and accelerating the financial and social development of vulnerable groups throughout the world, especially refugees and migrants».
The TV editor, Ninoslav Vucetic, recently shared a picture on Twitter showing a MasterCard with the logos of the EU and UNHCR. The note on Twitter addressed the authorities in Montenegro. Among others things, Vucetic asked who distributes the cards. It is not clear if the money that has paid for the cards, is supplied by MasterCard or by Soros, or if they come from the international aid budget of the UNHCR.
The same picture that is shown in the tweet by Vucetic is also present in various reports from the UNHCR, in which the bureau explains how to support migrants arriving in Southern Europe to move northwards. Hungarian authorities warns that about 70 000 migrants are now assembled in the Balkans, preparing to travel on to Northern and Western Europe.
Resett has also learned that Norway contributes financially to this. On their own homepage, UNHCR states that Norway is one of several countries participating in the financing along with several other Western countries, among them Australia, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, the USA and Great Britain, as well as the EU, South Korea and Japan.