Merkel says 'no plan B' for migration deal with Turkey
(MENAFN- The Journal Of Turkish Weekly) German ChancellorAngela Merkelon Feb. 28 said there was no ‘Plan B’ for theEuropean Uniondeal reached with Turkey for reducing the flow of migrants defending her open-door policy for migrants and rejecting any limit on the number of refugees allowed into her country despite divisions within her government.
Merkel said there was no ‘Plan B’ for her aim of reducing the flow of migrants through cooperation with Turkey efforts she said could unravel were Germany to cap the number of refugees it accepts.
“Sometimes I also despair. Some things go too slow. There are many conflicting interests in Europe” Merkel told state broadcaster ARD on Feb. 28. “But it is my damn duty to do everything I can so thatEuropefinds a collective way.”
Merkel spelled out her motivation to keep Germany’s borders open without limits on refugees a goal many in her own country and coalition government openly disagree with.
“There is so much violence and hardship on our doorstep” she said. “What’s right for Germany in the long term? There I think it is to keepEuropetogether and to show humanity.”
EU countries ‘must work together’
German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier toldGreekdaily Ta Nea in an interview on Feb. 29 that the EU countries must work together to deal with the migrant crisis troubling the bloc and avoid blaming each other.
“We must fight for Europe. We must stop blaming each other. On the contrary we must unite forces and work together for a European solution to the refugee crisis. This is the only way forEuropeto emerge stronger from this crisis” Steinmeier was quoted as saying by Reuters.
Merkel once highly popular has seen her ratings plummet because of her handling of the migrants issue.
The majority of those surveyed by public broadcaster ARD earlier in February were dissatisfied with her.
Germany attracted 1.1 million asylum seekers last year leading to calls from across the political spectrum for a change in its handling of refugees coming toEuropeto escape war and poverty in Syria Afghanistan and elsewhere.
Merkel now faces what she said on Feb. 28 was the biggest challenge of her decade in office.
She is struggling to secure a Europe-wide plan for dealing with the migrants. She is pinning her hopes on talks betweenEuropean Unionleaders and Turkey on March 7 and a migration summit on March 18 and 19.
After many failed attempts the two meetings look like the final chance to agree on a joint response before warmer weather encourages more arrivals across the Mediterranean. But Merkel said she would fight on for a European solution even were the March 7 meeting to fall short.
The migrants question has not only divided Europe. There is also strong dissent within Germany and the governing coalition.
Politicians from the state of Bavaria’s Christian Social Union the sister party to Merkel’s CDU have been critical of her stance.
They want a limit on the number of migrants similar to that imposed in Austria. So too does the majority of Germans in the ARD survey.
Austria the last stop on the way to Germany for hundreds of thousands of migrants recently imposed restrictions on its borders setting off a domino effect inEuropein limiting the flow of people and leaving hundreds stranded in Greece.
Merkel dismissed such a “rigid limit” saying: “There is no point in believing that I can solve the problem through the unilateral closure of borders.”
Stuck migrants stage protest atGreekborder with Macedonia
Thousands of refugees were stuck on Greece’s border with Macedonia overflowing from a packed camp into the surrounding fields as they waited for Macedonian authorities to let them continue their trek through the Balkans.
Police say about 6500 people were at or near the Idomeni border crossing on Feb. 29 with another 500 moved to a hastily erected camp on a small concrete landing strip some 20 kilometers away the Associated Press reported.
Macedonian authorities let 300 Syrians and Iraqis in between a few hours during midnight Feb. 29 after which the crossing closed. Macedonia has said it will only allow in as many people as Serbia the next country north on the Balkan migrant corridor accepts.
On Feb. 28 stranded migrants staged a protest at the border sitting and lying with their children across the train tracks. Some held up handwritten posters that read “Open the borders no food” and “We are humans not animals.”
“I’m 17 days on the road with my family and my two children. I don’t know what to do” one Syrian man told Athens News Agency as he lay across the tracks with his children.
Germany wants N. African states to take back more migrants
Meanwhile Germany wants North African countries to speed up repatriations of rejected asylum seekers Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere said ahead of a visit to the region.
De Maiziere who is to visit Morocco Algeria and Tunisia said many applicants lacked travel documents or gave false names and other personal details making it more difficult to send them back to their countries of origin.
Modern technology such as biometric identity papers could help he told AFP adding that “we could imagine offering our support” in the area.
“Our goal is to make the procedures more efficient and faster” he said in written responses to AFP questions ahead of his departure for Morocco later Feb. 28.
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