The ministry published an open call Wednesday soliciting a facility to accommodate 2,000-3,000 people with at least 3,000 metres of land and access to the motorway or the railway.

The centre will be needed after it was decided that the facility in Celje will be shut down in mid-January and the centre in Gornja Radgona on the border with Austria by the end of February, the ministry said.

There are currently over a dozen refugee centres around the country but only Dobova, the entry point for refugees from Croatia, and the Šentilj tent city on the border with Austria are regularly used.

All of the centres were in use in the initial stages of the refugee surge, but now refugees come by train to Dobova and are then transported by train either to Šentilj or towards Jesenice and on to Austria.

So far this year over 16,000 refugees and migrants entered Slovenia. Today there were over 1,600 arrivals and another train carrying around 900 is expected in the evening.

The total number of refugees and migrants who entered the country since mid-October is slowly approaching 400,000.