Prague, Sept 9 (CTK) – NATO should start a naval operation in the Mediterranean that should sink people smugglers’ ships and protect the Turkish border, Czech Finance Minister Andrej Babis said Wednesday.
Babis said he wanted to discuss the issue with NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg who is visiting the Czech Republic these days.
“I want to call on Stoltenberg to start the operation. With its joint forces, NATO should protect the Turkish border and the Mediterranean. It should sink the smugglers’ empty ships and help in further operations against the dangerous criminals and murderers whose business is threatening both the refugees and Europe,” Babis wrote in a press release.
“The behaviour of the people smugglers who do not shy anything is comparable with that of the Somalian pirates against whom NATO launched the operation Ocean Shield in August 2009,” Babis wrote.
“What about launching an operation Mediterranean Shield now?” he added.
Babis told journalists later that the people smugglers were making dozens of millions of euros from the migrants, who became their victims. He said the Mediterranean had become a mass grave, which no one was dealing with.
The Czech Republic might provide active help by sending a field hospital to the Turkish border or one of the Greek islands, Babis said.
NATO should help with the building of further refugee camps in the countries that are unable to cope with the refugee influx, he added.
“It is not true that Europe is not threatened,” Babis wrote.
“Due to the refugee crisis, the war in the Middle East and North Africa is also creating chaos on our continent,” he added.
“Islamic State warriors themselves have warned that their people will be infiltrate among the refugees,” Babis wrote.
A naval operation against migrant smugglers, EUNAVFOR MED, has already been launched by the European Union. In its final stage, the ships of people smugglers are to be sunken.
In the first stage, the operation rests in collecting and analysing intelligence information on the smugglers’ networks. An approval by the U.N. Security Council, currently being negotiated by EU diplomats, is required for EU ships to operate in the waters of North African countries, too.
Babis told journalists that the EU had not yet taken any operable measure. “Europe has nothing specific, but great declarations by politicians. There exists no solution,” he said.
Babis wrote that the accepting of refugees without knowing their real motivation was short-sighted.
“Naturally, women and children fleeing from war must be helped, it is a duty to help the endangered, but I believe that the motivation of the refugees differs. Most of them are seeking the lavish social systems of Germany and Britain,” Babis wrote.
He wrote that no politicians asked what would happen with Syria as soon as the conflict was over.
“Who will be restoring the country if all young and educated people settle in Germany? Will anyone of these people want to return to Syria, or on the contrary, will they invite further relatives to Europe? I am afraid that Europe is laying the foundations of a huge future problem with its attitude,” Babis wrote.
