Migrant labour: starting a discussion, and signs of hope

And now the long-awaited (sorry for the absence!) conclusion to my last post.
While we were protesting in front of the Slovenian embassy, the sun came out, and started to burn all of us. Our unwavering-ness before the embassy however was not in vain. After a couple of hours, the deputy ambassador emerged and asked a representative from the workers to come in—our request for negotiation had succeeded. Esad, one of the workers from Cazin, Nermina and Andrej went in to meet with the deputy ambassador, strolling past the line of security officers to the main doors of the embassy. The rest of us waited. And waited. And waited. At first, the protesters divided up into smaller groups of those who were already acquainted with each other. All of the members of Dosta Sarajevo sat together, students from Slovenia in another corner, workers under some trees, Faculty of Political Sciences people in another group. After an hour however, these initial bounded groups disappeared and everyone was stretched out all over the lawns on Bembaša. Workers were sharing their frustrations, with echoes of general frustration from other participants as well—mostly addressing the difficulties people had to make ends meet.
With an average salary country-wide of about 250-350 euros per month, and prices on par with those of many western European countries, Bosnia and Herzegovina is a country where poverty is rampant. This poverty remains largely invisible, however, because of the widespread nature of microcrediting in the post-war economy (people often take out micro-loans to buy groceries, at hugely inflated interest rates) and the artificial maintenance of the cash economy through diasporan cash inflow. I have still, to date, not met a single person in B&H who does not rely on some form of outside family support (whether arriving regularly or sporadically). Due to both pre-war gasterbeiter programs and war-time/post-war refugee flight, almost every Bosnian living inside the state today, has at least one or two relatives living outside of the state, mostly in the countries of Western Europe, Canada, the U.S. and Australia. These relatives, naturally, send cash (usually often) to their family, send gifts, and provide local economies with liquidity. This quite precarious situation, coupled with wide-spread visa programs in the EU has made migrant labour very attractive to many young people inside of B&H. In Slovenia alone, there is said to be about 47 000 migrant workers from B&H, working mostly physical jobs, such as construction, warehousing, transport etc.
Just when we thought that nothing was to come out of the meeting with the Slovenian deputy ambassaddor, Esad, Nermina and Andrej emerged and made a quick statement to the press. They had succeeded in convincing the Slovenian embassy in Sarajevo to act as a mediator in the labour dispute, and represent the workers form Cazin in talks with the Slovenian government, with the hope of eventually filing a suit against their former employer. The workers now have 2 months (until September 19th) to file their suit. This was not an ideal conclusion, but an excellent beginning. And in case the Slovenian government does not act upon the workers demands in the next few months, we will be prepared—more protests!!!