Prague, Dec 7 (CTK) – Czech politicians have rejected the decision of the European Commission (EC) to file a legal complaint over the refusal of migrant quotas against the Czech Republic, Poland and Hungary on Thursday.
President Milos Zeman’s spokesman Jiri Ovcacek repeated Zeman’s stance that the quotas interfered in the internal affairs of the country.
Petr Fiala, leader of the Civic Democratic Party (ODS), has warned that the complaint will reduce the trust in the EU.
Earlier on Thursday, EC Vice-President Frans Timmermans announced the decision to send the Czech Republic, Poland and Hungary to the EU court over their rejecting the quotas for the redistribution of asylum seekers.
Ovcacek reacted by referring to Zeman’s Tuesday statement on the migrant quotas.
“As far as my position is concerned, it says that I consider the quotas interference in the internal affairs of the Czech Republic or any other country,” Zeman said, adding that the quotas contradicted the principle of subsidiarity.
Fiala said the quotas were wrong and the EC complaint was an even worse decision.
“This will only result in more dissatisfaction and the feeling of being wronged,” Fiala has tweeted.
Fiala said the EU would not help the refugees with its complaint which would further reduce trust in the EU.
“The EC continues to cut the branch under itself. Instead of taking tough measures to solve migration and its causes, it has ineffectively focused on its consequences only. The quotas can solve nothing and we reject them even at the cost of being fined,” ODS deputy chairwoman Alexandra Udzenija said in a press release.
Jiri Pospisil, leader of TOP 09, said he was also sceptical about the complaint.
Disputes inside the EU must not be solved by legal complaints against its members, Pospisil said.
“Here, the complaint will only be grist in the mill of such politicians as [populist anti-European] Tomio Okamura,” he tweeted.
Tomio Okamura, leader of the anti-EU Freedom and Direct Democracy (SPD) movement, labelled the EC’s lawsuit “a brutal dictate by Brussels.”
“It is a brutal dictate saying that it is not us but Brussels who decides on our country,” Okamura wrote to CTK.
He said the Czech government must insist that no can can tell the Czech Republic whom it should accept.
In addition, the EC must know that the quotas will not solve migration but they send a message that the EU is ready to accept further immigrants, he said.
“More and more citizens of national states will realise this and demand their departure from such a group,” said Okamura, whose SPD seeks a referendum on Czech departure from the EU.
Christian Democrat (KDU-CSL) deputy chairman Ondrej Benesik said the EC’s quota-related lawsuit may negatively influence the public’s approach to the EU and play into the hands of political groupings such as Okamura’s SPD.
