EU Resettles 15K Refugees out of A Planned 160K

Local Editor

EU member states only relocated slightly more than 15,000 asylum seekers from Italy, Greece and Turkey out of 160,000 the EU initially pledged to resettle from these overburdened countries under the controversial mandatory refugee quota system.

The number of refugees resettled from Greece and Italyto the other EU member states and associated countries, including Switzerland and Norway, has reached 11,966, the latest European Commission progress report on relocation and resettlement schemes said.

Some 3,000 people "in need of international protection" were also accepted by the EU countries from Turkey under the EU-Turkey deal signed in March 2016, the report added, which was published Wednesday.

The report hailed "the overall positive trend" and stressed that December 2016 saw "the highest monthly number" of refugees resettled so far.

Still, the countries fail to meet the monthly requirement of 1,000 relocations from Italy and 2,000 from Greece, which were set by the European Commission.

"The past months have seen progress on both relocation and resettlement. But for our efforts to match the scale of the challenge in both the EU frontline Member States as well as our neighborhood, more needs to be done, and faster. Relocating all those eligible in Italy and Greece is possible but it takes political will, commitment and perseverance of all Member States to make it happen," the European Commissioner for Migration, Home Affairs and Citizenship, Dimitris Avramopoulos, said, commenting on the issue.

The European Commission Vice-President Frans Timmermans went further and said that it is "highly urgent" for countries to live up to their pledges and accelerate their efforts aimed at resettling refugees.

He also urged the EU member states that are actively participating in the EU program to use "peer pressure" to force other EU members to contribute, but ruled out any immediate legally binding actions on part of the EU authorities.

Source: News Agencies, Edited by website team