Prague, Nov 28 (CTK) – The Czech Republic and Germany will start jointly helping refugees in Jordan in order to improve their living conditions and reduce the reasons for them to leave for Europe, the Czech prime minister’s adviser Vladimir Spidla and German Deputy Foreign Minister Michael Roth agreed on Monday.
They made the agreement within the Czech-German strategic dialogue.
They said cooperation on helping directly in the Middle East is one of the measures that may contribute to solving the migrant crisis.
Roth told journalists that Prague and Berlin do not want to fight against refugees but against the causes of their mass departures. They want to contribute to this by a joint project in Jordan, he said.
It is not the EU but the countries such as Jordan, Lebanon and Turkey, which have accepted the largest number of refugees in the past months. EU countries should try to stabilise these countries, Roth said.
Spidla said the joint project in Jordan will immediately start to be prepared.
It will help improve the living conditions in some of the refugee camps supervised by the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), he said.
Spidla said Jordan is a country where the help makes a sense.
“It is a part of tackling the Syrian crisis and both our countries have quite good experience and contacts in this country. It would be the most effective in terms of time and effect,” Spidla said.
He and Roth also signed a memorandum of Czech-German cooperation in the area of migration and refugee integration.
In the memorandum, the two parties agreed that the refugee crisis can be solved only if aid is provided for people directly in the countries from which people have been leaving.
Besides, the Czech Republic and Germany put emphasis on effective protection of the EU’s external border, they say in the memorandum.
They state that migrants must observe the laws of the host countries and respect joint European values.
The memorandum admits that Prague and Berlin’s opinions differ when it comes to particular ways to tackle the migrant crisis, but says it is not necessary for them to agree on everything.
Roth said their task is to seek topics they have in common, not to permanently focus on the few issues on which their opinions differ.
Germany supports the quota system of migrant redistribution across the EU, while the Czech Republic is opposed to it.
