Visigrad Countries Pledge to Help Greece

Hungary, Poland, Czech Republic, and Slovakia pledge to help Greece deal with border crisis

By VOICE OF EUROPE 4 March 2020:

KASTANIES, Greece (AP) — Greek authorities fired tear gas and stun grenades Wednesday morning to repulse a push by migrants to cross its land border from Turkey, as pressure continued along its frontier after Turkey said its own border with Europe was open to whoever wanted to cross.

Meanwhile, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia pledged to help Greece to deal with pressure along its border.

Speaking after meeting his counterparts from the other three countries, Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis said the situation was serious and the EU must protect its borders.

“We’re ready to help,” Babis said.

Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said his country was ready to deploy guards at the Greek-Turkish border, while his Slovak counterpart Peter Pellegrini said the growing number of migrants “poses a security threat not just for Greece.”

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said that there are some 130,000 migrants on the move that the EU has to stop on its borders, and that “Hungary will take an active role in doing so.”

The four countries have been known for their tough stance against migrants and rejected an EU plan to redistribute refugees in member states.

Meanwhile, European Council head Charles Michel was meeting with Erdogan in Ankara Wednesday, while EU Vice President Josep Borrell and Commissioner for Crisis Management Janez Lenarcic were holding talks with Turkish Vice President Fuat Oktay.

Speaking to reporters after a meeting with Erdogan, Borell said that the EU delegation asked Turkey “not to encourage the further movement of refugees and migrants toward the EU borders.”

“We had the opportunity to express our understanding of the difficult situation Turkey is currently facing but also stressed that the current developments at the European borders is not leading to any solution,” he said.

Borell also told reporters that Turkish officials’ response was that Turkey was not encouraging people to move but that “they cannot prevent people from doing so.”

Greek authorities said there were about 15,000 people along the Greek-Turkish land border on Wednesday. They said that between Saturday morning and Wednesday morning, they had blocked 27,832 attempts to cross the border, and had arrested a total of 220 people who managed to cross.

Ankara has come under harsh criticism from some European countries.

“The people are being used by President Erdogan as a political football, as weapons and as instruments of pressure on the European Union,” Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz said Tuesday.

Fraser reported from Ankara, Turkey. Elena Becatoros in Athens and Karel Janicek in Prague contributed to this report.

© 2020 AP

Poland offers Greece support in tackling migration crisis

Polandin.com 4 Mar 2020:

On behalf of the Polish authorities, the Interior Affairs Minister Mariusz Kamiński has declared readiness to send 100 border guard soldiers and 100 police officers to support Greece in dealing with the migration crisis that has recently emerged at the country’s frontier with Turkey.

On Wednesday, EU member states’ interior affairs ministers met in Brussels at an extraordinary assembly in the wake of thousands of migrants and refugees from the Middle East gathering at the gate to Europe.

“We hope that the situation will settle down, but we have to take into account all the scenarios, which is why we are able to lend the Greeks a hand very quickly,” Minister Kamiński said.

The Commander of the Polish Border Guard, in consultation with the Minister of the Interior has already forwarded information on this matter to the European Border and Coast Guard Agency (Frontex). Greek authorities had previously requested the institution launch a rapid intervention as regards the migrants issue. Such interventions are intended to provide immediate assistance to an EU country whose border is under extreme pressure due to a large number of developing countries’ nationals attempting to enter its territory illegally.

As it stands, Frontex does not have its own regular corps, hence it must be based on border guards from EU states. After agreeing on a rapid intervention operational plan with Greece, Frontex will ask other EU and Schengen-associated countries to provide border guards and other personnel from the rapid response reserves immediately.

Mr Kamiński stated that Poland’s participation in any plan to relocate refugees would be out of the question if such a proposal were put forward.

“Refugee relocation is not an option, I stressed it clearly. What matters first and foremost is the real protection of the Greek-Turkish border, which we treat as the external EU border. On that matter, Poland presents concrete, real proposals that can mitigate the situation on the EU border,” the minister said.

On Wednesday morning, Greek services reported that from Saturday to Wednesday, they had stopped nearly 28,000 people attempting to cross the border illegally from Turkey and arrested 220 who had succeeded.