This rerouting has been prompted by Hungary's decision to close its border with Serbia in order to deter north African and Middle East migrants from entering its territory. According to some estimates made by the European Commission, over 54,000 have been stopped in Hungary in the recent migrants waves.
The Serbian web portal Blic reported on Tuesday evening that a score of buses currently being at bus station in Presevo, southern Serbia, were ready to depart from there towards Sid and Croatia.
The prospect of a long wait at the Hungarian border, possible imprisonment or expulsion back to Serbia may force many to seek alternative routes to the west across Croatia or to the east through Romania even though these countries are not part of the Schengen zone, according to some analyses.
Refugees seeking asylum in the European Union may end up seeking a new route as a result of Hungary's crackdown on entry, UNHCR spokeswoman Melissa Fleming said on Tuesday.
Croatia's police official Zlatko Sokolar, said that the Croatian police were ready to tackle a possible refugee wave.
There are 20,000 Croatian police officers and 6,000 border police. The local police in Vukovar-Srijem and Osijek-Baranja County precincts are braced for the first immigrant wave, Sokolar said on Tuesday.
On Wednesday morning, a Reuters cameraman said he saw dozens of migrants walking through cornfields towards Serbia's border with Croatia, following reports that at least 10 migrant buses had been rerouted to avoid Hungary. That witness said he had seen one bus arrive and at least 50 migrants walk through fields in the direction of Croatia, according to Reuters.
On the other hand, the spokesman for the police precincts in east Croatia, Domagoj Dzigumovic, told Hina on Wednesday morning that there had been no individual or mass entries of Syrian refugees in Croatia at the Croatian-Serbian border crossings.