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EU politicians from different parties reacted with horror to the fire in the Moria refugee camp. The first funding has been committed, but the fundamental conflict persists.
By Astrid Corall, ARD-Studio Brussels
Erik Marquardt, a Greens MEP, knows the Moria refugee camp on the Greek island of Lesbos very well and has been there since 2015. He reported on unsustainable conditions, warned of a disaster and demanded that something should be urgently changed. After the great fire, he accuses the EU member states of failure. He believes that the debate on immigration policy has become completely disconnected from reality. Plus:
“It has had too many people trying to make political capital from the challenges and problems that we have seen on the external borders.”
Member states have also failed from the point of view of SPD MEP Birgit Sippel: “There was a promise to relocate 1,600 unaccompanied minors, even that did not succeed in the near future. Let alone the relocation of another 12,000 people. of the field “.
400 unaccompanied children will be brought to the mainland
The President of the EU Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, also responded. She was deeply saddened, she wrote on Twitter. And that the EU and its member states are ready to help.
Homeland Commissioner Ylva Johansson had previously stated that the commission wanted to fund the immediate transfer and placement of the remaining 400 unaccompanied children and youth on the mainland.
CDU MEP Lena Düpont says: “Individual member states are welcome to join. Because in the acute situation it is perfectly clear that European solidarity is needed.” Düpont describes the situation at the external borders of the EU as “intolerable”.
Lawsuits against the federal government
Several MPs are calling for a speedy evacuation. And that the Member States are providing very specific help. The German government, for example, has to implement what many municipalities have offered, that is, accept refugees on a voluntary basis, says MEP Sippel. “I think we have 170 municipalities that have offered this, so Mr Seehofer must finally use these offers and put them into practice.”
Disagreement on a fair distribution of migrants
The Moria fire again sheds a special light on the problems of European asylum policy. Because one of the reasons that camps like the one in Moria could be established is that member states have been unable to agree on a fair distribution of migrants for years. While the countries on the external borders (Greece, Italy or Malta) feel neglected, some states, especially in Central and Eastern Europe, vehemently refuse to accept people.
The German Council Presidency and the EU Commission want to start the deadlocked debate. However, the pact on asylum and migration announced long ago by the Commission has been a long time coming. “Now it is more than urgently necessary for it to come on the table, and not just since the fires that night,” says Düpont.
But you and other European politicians don’t have to wait any longer. On September 30, the Commission wants to present its pact, as it is now called in Brussels.
