The Refugee Issue: What's up in Europe's Borders? (Satis Shroff)

The Refugee Issue: What’s Up in Europe’s Borders? (Satis Shroff)

The Europeans are not united regarding the distribution of refugees. An agreement was reached only on the 160,000 refugees. They will be sent to different states within the EU, according to Germany’s Thomas de Maiziere (CDU). 

The Middle East  European and Baltic states were against setting a fixed quota for the distribution of refugees. Another summit of the heads of governments and states will soon take place because of the freedom of travel in Europe after the Schengen System is endangered.

Germany made it clear that it does not want to take such a big number of refugee. Due to the border checks there’ll be chaos in the European borders. Chancellor Merkel rang Jean-Claude Junker (EU-Commission) and informed him about Germany’s decision to close the border to Austria in accordance with the Schengen system. Brussels was shortly thereafter informed about the decision, which was intended as an eye-opener aimed towards Hungary, Poland, Czech and Slovakia after their refusal to accept the refugee quota. The message was: if the East Europeans don’t show solidarity in this matter, then they’ll be risking the free movement of their own citizens in Europe, including the working possibilities of East Europeans throughout western Europe. In this context, Luxembourg’s foreign minister Jean Asselborn warned this would unleash a domino-effect. There was agreement only on the distribution of 160,000 refugees.

The closure of the borders is an emergency act deployed on Europe’s outer borders and will be reinforced by the European border agency Frontex. If, and when, borders of the EU states are closed by a certain country, without a unilateral agreement, it could lead to a loss of sovereignty within the country’s own border, which in turn can be precarious after 20 years of Schengen Agreement. Suddenly, Austrians, Slovakians, Germans, Dutch and Czechs governments want to control their borders. Germany’s Vice-Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel (SPD) said he was expecting a million refugees, which is more than the number proposed at the beginning of the flow of people from war-torn Syria and North Africa.

More than 11,400 refugees arrived till last Sunday in Nickelsdorf (Austria) and another 4000 are expected. Over the weekend 10,000 refugees entered Hungary from Serbia Due to the closing of the Hungarian border an increment of 20 % refugees are expected in Serbia via Macedonia. On Friday night alone 7,600 people crossed the Greek border to Macedonia along the 170 km border, from where they were transferred in buses and trains. The schools have started in Germany and the summer holidays are over, so the ferries are being chartered by the Greek government from the Grecian islands to transport the refugees to Athens and Saloniki, from there towards the north. Even though 258,000 people crossed the Aegis to Greece, only 7,500 people have actually applied for asylum. Turkey, it might be noted, has 1,9 million  registered ;  ¾ of them are Syrian war-refugees. Syrian refugees who had earlier fled to Jordan, Lebanon and Egypt have made their way to Turkey and from there to the west.

Brussels has praised Berlin’s role in the refugee issue and warned Hungary and Slovakia. Has the open border issue reached a dead-end?

 The European ministers will be meeting again on October 8, 2015.