Prague, Sept 9 (CTK) – The Czech government approved Wednesday the position for Interior Minister Milan Chovanec to promote at the forthcoming talks with his EU counterparts about the migration crisis, once again tasking him to reject the idea of compulsory quotas for the redistribution of refugees.
Prime Minister Bohuslav Sobotka (Social Democrats, CSSD) said in a press release he is glad that the EC, in its new proposals for solving the migration crisis, does not focus on the promotion of the quotas only.
The debate on the quotas prevents the EU from taking necessary steps, Sobotka said.
The proposal of the mandatory spread of another 120,000 refugees among EU countries was officially presented by EC President Jean-Claude Juncker in the European Parliament Wednesday. The proposal concerns the refugees now staying in Greece, Italy and Hungary.
The Czech Republic should accept another about 3,000 refugees, according to the EC’s proposal.
The Czech Republic and the other members of the Visegrad Four (V4) grouping, or Hungary, Poland and Slovakia, are opposed to the quotas.
They say the debate on them diverts attention from a real solution to the crisis, which should be a better protection of the Schengen border and an improvement of the situation in Syria and Libya, from where a large number of refugees come.
Sobotka said the termination of the war conflicts in the above countries should be the EU’s absolute foreign political priority.
President Milos Zeman, who attended the government’s meeting in connection with the forthcoming decision on the draft state budget for 2016, told journalists that he would like the decision-making to be shifted to the level of prime minister so that the countries that disagree with the “nonsensical proposal” be free to bloc it.
Zeman said the attempt to keep refugees in the Czech Republic is “rather irrational,” on the other hand, he welcomed the fact that the government’s decision was not unanimous.
Justice Minister Robert Pelikan (for ANO) was against it.
He told journalists that with its stance, the Czech Republic has found itself on the edge of the European mainstream.
“I think that our stance should be rather more constructive, if we do not want to be troublemakers,” Pelikan said.
He said is also necessary to deal with the problem of the migrants who are already in Europe, not only to seek support for ways of preventing Europe from further influx of refugees.
According to the government-approved mandate for Chovanec (CSSD), it is impossible to permanently raise the numbers of refugees to be redistributed in a situation where no all-EU system works.
The migrants should be stopped immediately after entering the EU, then divided into legitimate refugees and economic migrants, and the latter should be returned, the government writes in the document.
“We appreciate the EC’s proposals in this respect. However, if the redistribution of migrants were to be enforceable by law, the EU needs unambiguous and enforceable rules that would guarantee the above functions that are quite crucial,” the government writes.
In Brussels, Chovanec is also to assure the EU that the Czech Republic does not shun refugees and will help to an extent.
The government points out its decision earlier this year that the Czech Republic will accept 1500 refugees by the end of 2017.
“However, just because of the need of a constructive and comprehensive approach, the Czech Republic cannot support the raising of the relocation quotas or the introduction of a compulsory relocation mechanism until it is clear how the EU will systematically cope with the causes of the present migration crisis,” the government says in its position to be promoted by Chovanec.
Along with the presentation of quotas in the EP, Juncker also announced that the EC will propose the transformation of the Frontex agency into a real European service of the EU’s ground- and sea border protection by the end of the year.
He also presented the EU’s list of safe countries that would accelerate the handling of asylum applications by the EU countries.
“I am glad that the European Commission, in its proposed solutions to the migration crisis presented Wednesday, has ceased to focus on promoting the mandatory quotas only, and that it sees long-term and systemic solutions to the serious problem of uncontrolled migration as its priority,” Sobotka said.
“The mandatory quotas are no good solution and a continued discussion about their introduction only diverts whole Europe from taking really essential and necessary steps,” he said.
The EU interio
