Thursday, March 10, 2016
Time Is Running Out for Merkel to Solve the Migrant Crisis
How bad is the migrant crisis in Europe? Almost 500,000 migrants arrived in Greece in the 4th quarter of 2015. Most moved north through the Balkans, according to data that EU border agency Frontex released Thursday. Frontex, which collects data on irregular border crossings, recorded 484,000 of them on the Eastern Mediterranean route from Turkey to Greece in October--December, and 466,000 on the Western Balkan overland route, where migrants enter the EU at the Croatian border from non-EU Serbia. So, the total number of illegal EU border crossings was 978,300 in the 2015 4th quarter, a record since Frontex began collecting data in 2007. Of those arriving in Greece by boat from Turkey, 46% were Syrian and 28% Afghan. Frontex recorded fewer arrivals in Italy from Libya but noted a big increase in arrivals in Spain from Morocco, with 2,800 illegal crossings in the 4th quarter, a seasonal record that doubled from the 4th quarter of 2014. ~~~~~ In Italy, police arrested a 22-year-old Somali imam and asylum seeker on Wednesday on suspicion of planning an attack in Rome. He was detained at a migrant reception center, a police statement said : "We have clear technical evidence about the possibility that he was organizing an attack in Rome." The chief prosecutor released wiretap transcripts where the unnamed man discussed possible violence. A friend also told police the imam said : "Let's start from Italy, let's go to Rome and start with the station....equip oneself and blow oneself up." Italian police said he used his role as imam to promote ISIS and Somali al Shabaab and encouraged Moslems to take up jihad. The police said he had tried to recruit migrants to travel to Syria for training and he wanted to go there for training, too. ~~~~~ The EU refugee crisis is dangerous for the heavily indebted Greek economy. Greece needs substantial help to deal with the migrant influx, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) said Thursday. Greece already struggles to meet the terms of the bailout that's keeping it afloat. But, it is also the main EU gateway for hundreds of thousands of migrants. After OECD Secretary-General Angel Gurria met with Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, he told reporters : "The refugee crisis creates significant problems for the Greek economy and growth. Greece needs to receive substantial support to deal with this new challenge. No single country can address this challenge on its own." Tsipras has said he doesn't want to link the migrant crisis with negotiations on bailout targets and debt relief, but he warns that the EU migrant crisis could have a fiscal impact, with 41,000 migrants trapped in Greece because borders farther north in the Balkans are blocked. ~~~~~ The EU began a new €700 million aid program for member states last week that resembles EU disaster relief. Greece has asked for emergency funding and supplies, including tents, blankets, sleeping bags and ambulances, for the migrants. EU leaders are also negotiating a migrant deal with Turkey, but difficult legal details have to be worked out in order to sign off on it at a March 17-18 summit. EU officials know that stopping such desperate people will be difficult - and deporting them back to Turkey will be tough. One official said : "I don't know how to do it. It could get very ugly."~~~~~ And, dear readers, Chancellor Merkel has serious problems at home. Polls show anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany (AfD) set to enter three state parliaments by winning up to 18% in Sunday's regional elections. This would be a big setback for Merkel and her open-door refugee policy. The elections are the first in Germany since the refugee crisis began and voters will be able to deliver a message to parties about the influx of 1.1 million migrants last year. The AfD will take seats from older parties and hope to make it harder for Merkel to form a coalition government, but there is no indication that Sunday will harm her conservative/center-left coalition. But the clock is ticking and Merkel must find an acceptable solution soon.
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All of the EU in fact all of Europe seems to be of the mindset that nothing can be done about the migrant infestation that STARTS in the Middle East and winds its road deep into northern Europe.
ReplyDelete"JUST SAY NO" - that seems to be a simple enough solution.
Where is it written, or was it ever written that the Middle Easterners had the right to travel at will from their homelands into Europe and disrupt the citizens, the governments, and the economies of nations that have or ever had any bearing on the conditions in their homelands in the past 40 years - 2 generations of Muslims wanting something that they could not obtain for themselves via peaceful or revolutionary methods at home.
Europe/EU nations and their economies owe these historically nomadic people nothing. But they do owe their own people something - safety from peoples that are as different as night is to day.
The molding in of these Muslims will never be peaceful or desirable for the cultural, economies, or the betterment of Europe. NEVER
Look Europe from where these migrants are coming - is this what you want your neighborhoods, cities or towns to look like in a year or so. Do you want the next generations of Europeans to be something you are not?
Decide what you want for your families, friends, towns, countries and then change the leadership starting with Ms. Merkel in Germany. Take back what is yours.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel has blamed European nations for "unilaterally" shutting the Balkan route for migrants. She said this had put Greece in a "very difficult situation" and such decisions should be taken by the whole of the EU.
DeleteIs Chancellor Merkel admitting that she has no control over each and every one of her socialistic children in the EU? Is she advocating that what is good for Germany must be good for the entire European Union? Is she admitting that she has (as believed to be true) that her tight control over Germany is failing and is creating cracks in the hulls of the other sister ships in the EU?
Now friend this may well be the very worst time for Merkel to lose control of Germany first and the EU second.
How do you feel about bringing (more) terrorists from Al Qaeda, Iraq and Afghanistan, etc. to European soil?
ReplyDeleteYou say you don’t have any strong feelings one way or another? Well you should America, you really should.
The more questionable Muslims with very questionable past (and futures) that under the disguise of being displaced migrants move into the European community, the more the youngest percentage of those migrants will sooner or later end up in America.
Remember the numbers 12-15%. That is the percentage of a countries population if concentrated in one radical, migrant immigration influx it takes to totally disrupt the balance of power, the cultural life, and the ensuing generation of Europe.
This new generation will be known as Iranian-French, or Mohamad Smith, or Chancellor Omar el (something).
There is time – not a lot of it – to stop this migrating alteration of society.