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Showing posts with label Migrant Crises. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Migrant Crises. Show all posts

7/3/17

EU Migrant crises: France, Germany, Italy agree to work together on migrant crisis

Interior ministers from France, Germany and Italy met in Paris over the weekend to talk about Italy’s migrant crisis. Further discussions are expected to take place later this week during EU talks in Tallinn this week.

Italy had threatened to block NGO ships that have been transporting what is says is the “unsustainable” flow of people to its shores.

Some 1.7 refugees and migrants have reached EU shores since 2014, reported Reuters. Italy has admitted 500,000 during that period. The numbers are growing.

The EU want other member states to allow the boats transporting the migrants across the Med to dock in their ports to alleviate growing pressure on Rome.

Read More: France, Germany, Italy agree to work together on migrant crisis | Euronews

5/22/17

EU Refugee Relocation Policies: European Parliament denounces Member States' failure to relocate refugees | Greens/EFA

The European Parliament has today supported with a very strong majority a resolution on the relocation of refugees in the EU. It calls for Member States to implement their decision of September 2015 to relocate 160,000 refugees in the EU. Ska Keller, co-president of the Greens/EFA group in the European Parliament and initiator of the parliamentary resolution, comments:

"It is a strong signal that a large majority of the European Parliament has denounced the failure of the Member States to relocate refugees. Member States must finally implement the relocation of 160,000 refugees from Greece and Italy. Those Member States that continue to boycott relocation cannot be allowed to get away with their refusal to show solidarity. The Commission must initiate infringement procedures against them. It is outrageous that so far only 11% of the 160,000 refugees have been relocated.

"Sealing-off European borders against refugees and migrants is not a solution. If we want to avoid terribly overcrowded refugee camps and unsustainable conditions for those seeking protection in the EU's southern frontiers, we need solidarity between Member States. Greece and Italy cannot be expected to take care of asylum seekers on their own."

EU-Digest

3/4/16

Schengen Treaty: EU to restore Schengen by end of the year

Seven out of 26 Schengen countries have emergency border controls in place, including Germany. On Friday, the Commission said it wanted them all lifted no later than December.

Under the Schengen agreement, 26 countries allow passport-free travel without border checks. But of those have re-introduced internal border controls since September in to help stem the most significant migration flows Europe has seen in decades.

Open internal borders are seen as a major achievement of European integration that improved travel, tourism, trade and supply chains across the bloc, boosting growth.

But the commission's plan also calls for a new European border and coast guard to start operating in the summer to secure the bloc's external borders. Overwhelmed Greece is to receive more support in securing its border with Turkey.

EU Commissioner Dimitris Avramopolous, who presented the plan on Friday, said managing Europe's borders was essential.

Read more: EU to restore Schengen by end of the year | News | DW.COM | 04.03.2016

Migrant Crises EU: France and Germany united on migration crisis, says Hollande

French President François Hollande said Friday that Paris and Berlin had "the same spirit and the same will" in handling the migrant crisis, which has at times strained bilateral ties. Hollande met Chancellor Angela Merkel in Paris to discuss the crisis that has seen hundreds of thousands flooding to the EU to escape poverty and conflict, notably in Syria.

French Prime Minister Manuel Valls said in February that Paris was "not in favour" of Merkel's proposal to set up a permanent system to redistribute more refugees around Europe.

"France has committed to take 30,000 refugees ... but no more," Valls said.

He also said that Merkel's liberal refugee policy, which brought 1.1 million asylum seekers to Germany in 2015, was not sustainable in the long run.

However despite their differences, Hollande insisted Friday that "France and Germany are working with the same spirit and the same will" on the crisis.
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Read more: france 24 - France and Germany united on migration crisis, says Hollande - France 24

2/25/16

EU Migrant Crises: The EU must be able to face, acknowledge and fix the root of the problem - by RM

As the saying goes "concern yourself more accepting responsibility than with assigning blame".

US continuous criticism of the EU’s handling of the refugee crisis is the case in point .

Let's face it - the EU migrant crises comes as a direct result of a Europe which is still blindly following a US led foreign policy which is part of the so-called "allied commitments".

When these plans,however, as most of them usually do, turn into human disaster, Europe is required to carry the burden of fixing the mess afterwards..

The above specifically reflects on a totally flawed EU Middle-East foreign policy (a carbon copy of that of the US), specially in regions of the Muslim World, the Middle East and North Africa.

Where exactly is the line between inaction and complicity? The notion of neutrality, for a country as powerful as the United States, is illusory. Doing nothing or “doing no harm” means maintaining or reverting to the status quo, which in the Middle East is never neutral, due to America’s and Europe's  longstanding relationships with regional political actors.

Europe’s refugee crisis might feel a million miles away for many Americans, but there is something everyone can relate to: money:  and this ompletely messed up Middle East foreign policy could cost the United States several hundred billion dollars eventually.

That’s according to the Bertelsmann Foundation, a respected think tank here in Germany, which looked at the potential economic consequences if Europe were to reinstate border controls within its 26-country passport-free travel area.

As the continent buckles under the weight of the most serious refugee crisisever  since World War II, the breakdown of that zone, known as the Schengen Area, has loomed as a dark prospect.

Reinstating border checks are bad for European business, experts say. They would even stunt economic growth through a vicious cycle that starts with higher labor costs — thanks to long lines at borders — and ends with declining sales and lower production.

If this happens it would mean major economic losses for the EU could reach up to 1.4 trillion by 2025.

So what to do about it? It would basically need two essental steps to be taken by the EU .

The first would be to immediately decouple the EU foreign policy from that of the failed US Middle East foreign policy; secondly, invest in a  far reaching Euro-Mediterranean - North African Free Trade Area, which would aim at establishing peace and prosperity in the area by removing barriers to trade and investment between both the EU and countries in that area, based on mutual respect and recognition of all  freely elected governments, religious freedom and cultural ties.

It obviously would be a long and difficult process, but the results would certainly be far more rewarding, productive and beneficial to all the people in the area, and obviously less costly than the useless and destructive military campaigns most nations within the EU and the US are presently involved in.

EU-Digest  
 

10/16/15

Turkey - Migrant crisis: EU backs Turkey action plan

EU states have backed an action plan with Turkey, which it is hoped will ease the flow of migrants to Europe.

Nearly 600,000 migrants have reached the EU by sea so far this year, many of them travelling from Turkey.

The leaders agreed to speed up visa liberalisation talks for Turks if Turkey stems the influx and to "re-energise" talks on it joining the EU.

However, the Turkish foreign minister said the deal was still a draft and had not been agreed upon.
Feridun Sinirlioglu called the financial measures proposed by the EU "unacceptable", according to AFP news agency.

Meanwhile a migrant thought to be Afghan was shot dead by a Bulgarian border guard after entering the country from Turkey late on Thursday.

Bulgarian Prime Minister Boyko Borisov left the Brussels talks on hearing the news.

Also on Friday, Hungary announced it was going to seal its border with Croatia at midnight (22:00 GMT) following a similar move last month to close its border with Serbia.

Read more: Migrant crisis: EU backs Turkey action plan - BBC News

10/8/15

Migrant crisis: EU to begin seizing smugglers' boats

The EU is beginning a new operation in the southern Mediterranean to intercept boats smuggling migrants.

Under Operation Sophia, naval vessels will be able to board, search, seize and divert vessels suspected of being used for people smuggling.

Until now, the EU has focused on surveillance and rescue operations.

So far this year, more than 130,000 migrants and refugees have crossed to Europe from the north African coast. More than 2,700 have drowned.

However, many more migrants and refugees - mainly Syrians fleeing the country's civil war - are taking a different route. They are crossing overland into Turkey, before a short journey by sea to European Union member

Read more: Migrant crisis: EU to begin seizing smugglers' boats - BBC News