• Military Menu                       

• Introduction
• Systems
• Facilities
• Agencies
• Industry
• Operations
• Countries
• Hot Documents
• News
• Reports
• Policy
• Budget
• Congress
• Links

• WMD
• Intelligence
• Homeland Security
• Space

EU Ministers Agree On 32,000 Initial Refugee Relocations

September 14, 2015
by RFE/RL

European Union interior ministers meeting in Brussels have agreed on an initial relocation of about 32,000 refugees away from Italy and Greece to other EU member states.

The figure is less than an initial 40,000 relocations requested by the European Commission in May and falls far short of a total of 160,000 relocations called for last week by European President Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker.

On September 14, the EU interior ministers were trying to narrow their differences on how to share the burden caused by thousands of migrants who continue to arrive in the EU each day.

Most of that burden is being carried by Italy, Greece, and Hungary –- the countries where most migrants are first entering the EU.

European Council President Donald Tusk has said he would summon EU leaders for an emergency summit if their interior ministers could not agree to a solution.

On September 9, Juncker unveiled an emergency plan for dealing with Europe's biggest influx of migrants and asylum seekers since World War II.

He called for the EU interior ministers on September 14 to approve a compulsory program to relocate across the entire EU a total of 160,000 refugees currently in Italy, Greece, and Hungary.

The proposal involves mandatory quotas on how many refugees, mostly from Syria, that each EU country should host.

France supports quotas -- as does Germany, the main destination for many migrants who are seeking asylum in the EU.

But some EU countries oppose a compulsory system, including the Czech Republic, Slovakia, and Hungary.

Balkan Route

Since July, Hungary has become a point of entry into the EU for thousands of migrants each day who have been passing through Turkey into Greece before traveling along an overland Balkan route that crosses Macedonia and Serbia.

Most of those on the overland Balkan route are from Syria, Iraq, or Afghanistan.

The September 14 talks in Brussels, which involve the interior ministers of all 28 EU countries, were taking place a day after Germany reintroduced controls at its border with Austria to stem the continuing flow of refugees.

As the talks were under way, Austria deployed soldiers on its border with Hungary to stem the flow of migrants.

Austrian Interior Minister Johanna Miki-Leitner said Vienna was following Germany's lead in taking a similar decision.

Miki-Leitner argued that 'temporary border controls are allowed' in a crisis under the Schengen agreement, the accord that established a 26-country region within the EU where internal borders between members are meant to remain open.

On September 13, officials in Budapest said a record 5,809 migrants had entered Hungary in a single day as part of a new surge of refugees seeking to enter the EU through the overland Balkan route.

Hungary on September 14 closed a main informal crossing point that has been used by migrants to cross into EU territory after traveling through Serbia.

But there were reports later in the day that small groups of migrants were being allowed through an official border crossing, Horgos 2.

A new law comes into force in Hungary on September 15 under which any person who enters the country illegally can be jailed for up to three years.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said on September 14 that he expected that a high rate of asylum requests submitted after the law comes into effect to be rejected.

The United Nations refugee agency said on September 14 that each country had a right to protect its borders.

But it expressed concerns that a newly built fence along Hungary's entire border with Serbia could limit the rights of migrants who are seeking asylum.

Meanwhile, Slovakia announced on September 14 that it had renewed checks on its borders with Hungary and Austria due to the crisis.

Those checks had been discontinued since Slovakia and Hungary both became members of the Schengen area.

The arrival of about 500,000 migrants in the EU so far in 2015 has taken the EU by surprise and it has responded slowly.

With reporting by AFP, AP, and Reuters

Source: http://www.rferl.org/content/eu-migrant-crisis-emergency-meeting/27246226.html

Copyright (c) 2015. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.