Europe must avoid divisive responses to the migration crisis such as “arbitrary” border closures that risk turning frontline states like Greece into vast refugee camps, said the new head of the U.N. refugee agency, Filippo Grandi.
In the two months since he took the helm of the UNHCR, the arrival of thousands of refugees has strained the bonds between the 28 members of the EU. However, despite the temptation for some countries to go it alone, reverting the decision-making to national capitals, the 58-year-old Italian remains convinced the EU can come up with a unified response to the crisis.
“I can go to Vienna and Berlin, but I still believe the solution is here,” Grandi said in an interview in Brussels. “Europe can solve the migration crisis only if it stays united and if member states work with each other.”
So far, attempts to contain the biggest influx of refugees since World War II have failed repeatedly, and Austria dealt the EU’s attempts at a unified approach a heavy blow by unilaterally capping the number of arrivals. The resulting chain reaction along the Balkan corridor which is used by migrants to reach Germany pushed Greece, the entry-point, to the verge of collapse.
“I still hope that Greece will not turn into the largest refugee camp in Europe,” said Grandi, speaking between meetings with EU officials in Brussels to try to bolster funding for the government in Athens, which in turn threatens to veto any EU decision on migration strategies, ahead of a leaders’ summit next Monday, if fellow member countries leave Greece to its own devices.
Vienna’s breakaway decision also encouraged already reticent Central and Eastern Europeans to continue refusing to take in refugees as part of a previously agreed EU-wide relocation plan. This further exacerbates the situation in Greece, which with its struggling economy and public-sector cutbacks must now care for thousands of stranded migrants, possibly for a long time.
Last summer, member states agreed to support Greece and Italy by relocating 160,000 refugees, who would be shared out by EU nations in proportion to their relative population size. Progress has been painfully slow: The first relocation took place in October when 19 Eritreans moved from Italy to Sweden. A month later, 30 asylum seekers traveled from Greece to Luxembourg.
According to the European Commission’s latest figures, 598 refugees have been relocated so far and by February 24, only 17 EU countries had offered to take 4,678 refugees from Greece and Italy, prompting the Commission to call on member countries to “substantially increase their support to meet the target.”
Grandi said he understood the strains that Europe was facing and acknowledged that the “wave-through policy” had to end. But the best solution remained keeping borders open, managing the flow and implementing the relocation plan, he said.
“Relocations of refugees, not arbitrary border closures, are the way out of the crisis,” Grandi said.
More money
When the refugees still continued to stream unabated from Greece to Macedonia, through Serbia, Croatia and Slovenia and into Austria and Germany and onwards to Scandinavia, the UNHCR helped by providing the people on the move with blankets, bottled water, food and temporary shelter including containers with beds and heating units.
Now, with thousands of people still arriving each day in Greece but unable to move beyond its border with Macedonia, most of the €80 million the UNHCR has allocated Greece from its 2016 budget will be spent on accommodations.
If Greece’s northern borders are closed more permanently, Grandi said — he was speaking before tension erupted there this week, when Macedonian police used teargas to stop groups of migrants forcing their way in from Greece near the town of Idomeni — more money will be needed. Much more.
“The main point I am trying to make is that we will need more money,” Grandi said, adding that Greece needs to upgrade its migrant reception centers and consider housing refugees in pre-existing emergency shelter or even apartments to accommodate them for periods of months rather than days. “We strongly discouraged Greece to create large refugee camps.”
In its last appeal for funds in January, the UNHCR asked for $235 million to support Eastern Mediterranean and Western Balkan states. So far they have received $109.5 million. Last year, Britain was the most generous donor from the EU and countries like France and Greece chipped in the least, according to UNHCR data made available to POLITICO.
Grandi said the number of refugees that Europe is now coping with — approximately 1 million, mostly in Germany — was “ridiculously low” when compared to countries closer to the war in Syria, such as Lebanon, Jordan and Turkey, especially when Europe’s greater resources and space are taken into account.
“Syria proved to the world what we have been saying for a very long time, namely that the problem of refugees cannot be confined to a region or neighboring countries,” he said. “Let’s not forget that Lebanon, a country of 4.5 million people, has a million (Syrian) refugees.”
“I think that the EU member states, apart from those who actually took in the refugees — namely Greece and Italy — and those who welcomed them, as in Germany, Austria and Sweden, could do much more,” said Grandi.
The UNHCR’s own resettlement plan is also making slow progress, which Grandi acknowledged needed more aggressive promotion among refugees, who often didn’t have enough information to take advantage of it.
“Many refugees I spoke to in Istanbul do not really know where they want to go when they arrive, so they follow the flow and end up in Germany,” he said.
Like German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Grandi believes the implementation of the Turkey-EU Joint Action Program is key to curbing the flow of refugees to Europe. But he appeared frustrated at the length of time it has taken for Europe to allocate the €3 billion it pledged to Turkey to help it cope with the large numbers of Syrian refugees that it is hosting.
“We have been talking about this for several months,” Grandi said. “Finally, the Commission and member states got an agreement and a green light to spend it.”
The same problem applies to the $11 billion for refugees raised at the London donors’ conference in January, he said.
“One month has passed and we still do not know how the funds will be spent,” Grandi said. “These things cannot wait six months. We need to act very quickly if we want to make an impact.”
This article was updated to correct Filppo Grandi’s age.
