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Relief work in frontline states – Poland, Slovakia, Romania, Hungary and Moldova – has mainly been shouldered by ordinary citizens volunteering to drive, cook or house refugees, with the help of non-governmental organisations and local authorities.

But with the war now in its third week and the number of refugees swelling, it is becoming difficult to provide sufficient help.

In Krakow, Poland’s second-largest city, one NGO described the situation at the train station as “tragic”.

“There is nowhere to direct the refugees. They are stressed and confused, all kinds of help is needed, and above all, premises,” tweeted Fundacja Brata Alberta, an NGO that in normal times helps individuals with mental disabilities.

In Hrubieszow, a Polish town on the Ukrainian border, Mayor Marta Majewska said she had spent all the town’s crisis reserve of 100,000 zlotys ($22,889), as well as 170,000 zlotys from the local province, to run a refugee reception centre.

“I am most worried about electricity bills,” she told Radio Zet. “The city cannot bear it at all.”

FILLING UP FAST

In Warsaw, the biggest temporary reception centre was about 70% full by Thursday. Refugees now make up over 10% of the Polish capital’s population, Mayor Rafal Trzaskowski said.

Close to 4,000 Ukrainian children are now attending school in Warsaw, he added, with city authorities setting up 76 “preparatory classes” in which they learn Polish.

Trzaskowski separately called for other nations to step in, urging airlifts and a global system to manage the influx.

“We’re getting overwhelmed… We cannot improvise anymore,” he told U.S. television network MSNBC. “We need relocation in Europe and we need relocation in the world.”

U.S. President Joe Biden said on Friday the United States would welcome those fleeing the conflict.

“We’re going to welcome Ukraine refugees with open arms if in fact they come all the way here,” he told a group of U.S. lawmakers. He gave no details.

In Przemysl, near Poland’s busiest border crossing and a transit hub for refugees, Vice-Mayor Boguslaw Swiezy said he was seeing a decline in the number of volunteers, some of whom are students, others people taking time off work.

The Polish government will start reimbursing local governments’ costs for handling refugees from next week, once a new law comes into force, the interior ministry said.

Romania’s capital Bucharest was turning a convention centre and indoor arena, Romexpo, into its biggest refugee shelter yet, while Hungary was studying whether to turn museums, sports arenas and public buildings in Budapest into shelters.

The Hungarian government is also providing subsidies to employers who take on refugees to help cover accommodation and travel costs. In the Czech Republic, Prague mayor Zdenek Hrib called for more government funds to help accommodate refugees.

‘I DON’T KNOW WHAT TO DO NEXT’

And the refugees just keep arriving.

Dasha, a 31-year-old psychotherapist from Kyiv, arrived on Friday at Medyka, Poland’s busiest border crossing with Ukraine, where temperatures overnight dropped to -9 degrees Celsius (15.8 degrees Fahrenheit).

She left Kyiv on the first day of the invasion and stayed in the western city of Lviv but has now left Ukraine on the advice of her husband, who is in the army reserve.

“It’s tough in Kyiv, they are encircling the city,” she told Reuters, with two little dogs on their leashes.

“I’m going to Wroclaw (in southwest Poland), I have some friends there,” she said before bursting into tears. “I don’t know what to do next.”

Inna, a 55-year old woman fleeing Dnipropetrovsk, said she had travelled 24 hours to reach Medyka.

“My town was bombed this morning… I just can’t talk, I am so overwhelmed,” she sobbed.

She did not know where she would spend Friday night.

The United Nations bases its relief plans on 4 million people fleeing abroad, but has said it may need to revise the number higher.

The Polish Border Guard said 1.5 million people had entered Poland from Ukraine since Russia began its invasion on Feb. 24.

Nearly 365,000 people have so far fled into Romania, 219,000 to Hungary and 176,000 to Slovakia, officials said. Nearly 200,000 have reached the Czech Republic, which does not share a border with Ukraine.

Others are reaching or are seen getting to German, Sweden and other countries in Western Europe.

Russia calls its actions in Ukraine a special military operation to disarm its neighbour and dislodge its “neo-Nazi” leaders. Kyiv and its Western allies say this is a baseless pretext to invade a country of 44 million people.

(Additional reporting by Mari Saito in Medyka, Anna Wlodarczak-Semczuk in Warsaw, Luiza Ilie in Bucharest, Robert Muller in Prague, Anita Komuves and Krisztina Than in Budapest, Jeff Mason in Washington; Writing by Gwladys Fouche, additional writing by Susan Heavey; Editing by Gareth Jones and Angus MacSwan),

Source: https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2022-03-11/eastern-europes-aid-effort-under-strain-as-ukraine-refugees-keep-arriving

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Populists seize chance to put favorite issue on agenda ahead of EU vote, causing ructions among governments.

A previously obscure 34-page, jargon-filled document is causing political convulsions across Europe — even though it’s not even legally binding.

Italy this week became the latest in a string of European countries to say it would not sign the U.N.’s Global Compact on Migration at a ceremony in Marrakech in just under two weeks. From the Netherlands through Belgium and Germany to Slovakia, the pact has triggered infighting in ruling parties and governments, with at least one administration close to breaking point.

The fight over the pact illuminates how migration remains a combustible issue across the Continent, three years after the 2015 refugee crisis and with next May’s European Parliament election on the horizon. Far-right parties keen to make migration the key campaign issue have seized on the pact while some mainstream parties have sought to steal their thunder by turning against the agreement. Liberals and centrists, meanwhile, have found themselves on the defensive — arguing that the agreement poses no harm and migration is best handled through international cooperation.

Louise Arbour, the senior U.N. official overseeing the pact, said she is surprised by the controversy, as diplomats from 180 countries — including many that have now pulled out — signed off on the text last summer after two years of negotiations.

The initiative was launched at the request of Europe after the migration surge of 2015, Arbour said. The countries now having “second thoughts or misgivings” were very active during the negotiations and “extracted compromises from the others,” she told POLITICO in an interview.

Arbour, a former Canadian judge and U.N. human rights commissioner, said the recent backtracking illustrates a clear “disconnect” between some countries’ foreign policies “and domestic pressures or national concerns that were not included into the process.”

She stressed the compact is not binding and, after its formal adoption next month, “there is not a single member state that is obligated to do anything that it doesn’t want to.”

The Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration, to give it its full name, sets out a “cooperative framework” for dealing with international migration. Signatories agree, for example, to limit the pressure on countries with many migrants and to promote the self-reliance of newcomers. The document states that no country can address migration alone, while also upholding “the sovereignty of States and their obligations under international law.”

That assurance has not been enough to placate many in Europe. Hungary, whose Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has made anti-migrant policies his signature issue, pulled out while the pact was being negotiated. But the recent wave of European withdrawals was triggered by conservative Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz, who renounced the pact at the end of October.

German Interior Minister Horst Seehofer (left), Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz (center) and his coalition partner Heinz-Christian Strache (right) meet in Vienna to discuss immigration, July 2018 | Michael Gruber/Getty Images

Heinz-Christian Strache, the leader of the far-right Freedom Party, Kurz’s coalition partner, declared that “Austria must remain sovereign on migration” and said the country is “playing a leading role in Europe.” At least in terms of the pact, that turned out to be true with Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Poland, Estonia, Croatia and Switzerland all following Vienna’s lead.

Bratislava, Berlin and beyond

Slovakia is among the most recent countries to withdraw its support for the pact. After an EU summit on Sunday, Prime Minister Peter Pellegrini said Bratislava would not support the pact “under any circumstances and will not agree with it.”

Foreign Minister Miroslav Lajčák on Thursday said he would resign after parliament decided to reject the pact. Lajčák was president of the U.N. General Assembly when the migration pact was adopted.

Populist parties in other countries have forced the pact to the top of the political agenda. The Dutch government under Prime Minister Mark Rutte has come under pressure from far-right leaders, including Geert Wilders and Thierry Baudet, who refers to the agreement as the “U.N. Immigration Pact.” The government ordered a legal analysis of the text last week to ensure that signing it will not entail any legal consequences. The Cabinet finally decided on Thursday that it would support the pact, but would add an extra declaration, a so-called explanation of position, to prevent unintended legal consequences.

In Germany, the pact has become an issue in the battle to succeed Angela Merkel — the EU politician most associated with a more liberal approach to migration — as leader of the ruling Christian Democratic Union (CDU). Two of the leading contenders for the post, Jens Spahn and Friedrich Merz, have both criticized the agreement and called for it to be amended.

The German chancellor mounted a spirited defense of the pact, telling the Bundestag last week that the agreement is in Germany’s national interest as it will encourage better conditions for refugees and migrants elsewhere in the world.

Arbour argued that although the pact is not legally binding, it is still worthwhile. “The pact is a major cooperation project … a political initiative to align initiatives for the common benefit,” she said.

But such arguments cut little ice with the WerteUnion (“Union of Values”), a group of thousands of conservative members of the CDU and its Bavarian sister party. It takes issue with multiple sections of the pact, such as a declaration that migrants “regardless of their status, can exercise their human rights through safe access to basic services.” The group argues that as German social benefits are high, such a commitment would encourage migrants to come to Germany.

Michel has been consulting with a handful of European countries to produce a joint statement to be attached to the pact | Leon Neal/Getty Images

In Belgium, the pact has put liberal Prime Minister Charles Michel’s coalition government at risk. The Flemish nationalist N-VA, the biggest party in government, has demanded Belgium withdraw from the agreement. Michel is caught between his commitment to the pact and his coalition partner’s rejection of it — while seeking to fend off a Francophone opposition that will take any opportunity to portray him as a puppet of the Flemish nationalists ahead of federal, regional and European elections next May.

Searching for a way to keep his government afloat, Michel has been consulting with a handful of European countries including Denmark, Estonia, the U.K. and Norway, to produce a joint statement to be attached to the pact, according to Belgian media. Another idea is for several of those countries to join the Netherlands in signing a common “explanation of position,” Dutch newspaper De Volkskrant reported.

Arbour said it’s too late to start making changes to the pact itself. Renegotiating the text or attaching an extra statement is “not what other [countries] have signed up to,” she said.

Source: https://www.politico.eu/article/migration-un-viktor-orban-sebastian-kurz-far-right-pressure-europe-retreats-from-pact/

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The murder of journalist Jan Kuciak and his fiancé, Martina Kusnirova, shocked Slovakia like no other event since the country’s independence 25 years ago. But the sentiment of shock and deep grief is now increasingly becoming mixed with outrage. Friday saw the biggest demonstrations in the country since the Velvet Revolution in 1989. One hundred thousand people took to the streets nationwide, with an estimated 50,000 people in Bratislava alone — a very large number for a country of 5 million people.

The motto at the rallies was “Let’s stand up for a fair Slovakia.” People in the country are taking to the streets to demonstrate against corruption and abuse of power. They are demanding that the rule of law apply across the board and want more transparency and more responsible government leaders. The current demonstrations are the biggest yet, but they are far from being the first. Protests have been flaring up periodically for years against Robert Fico’s government and his so-called Social Democratic Party (SMER-SD). Investigative journalists continue to uncover unbelievable corruption among SMER members and other government politicians, without the scandals ever having had political or legal consequences.

High price of success

Keno Verseck reports regularly from central and southeastern Europe

A widespread and deep dissatisfaction is behind the current protests. In particular, people are unhappy with the way the transition from the real socialist dictatorship to democracy and a market economy has been made. It is true that, from a macroeconomic point of view, Slovakia is now rightly regarded as a successful country in the eastern part of the European Union. But it has paid a high price for this success. Hundreds of thousands of people became the social losers of years of hard economic reform policies after the end of the dictatorship. There may have been a greater acceptance of this if Slovakia’s citizens hadn’t had to witness a small elite, whose members had often already been among the winners under the dictatorship, shamelessly lining their pockets with the former national wealth in a highly criminal manner.

This kind of self-dealing by the elite continues to this day, but the powerful are now paying attention to the appearance of legality through legal tricks or by passing laws with sufficiently large loopholes. Nonetheless, it remains thoroughly immoral. Fico and his party have been hiding all this behind half left-wing populist and half right-wing nationalist rhetoric.

No strong political alternative

As large and justified as the Slovak citizens’ dissatisfaction may be, the citizen movements have not managed to become a political force. There is currently no strong political alternative that credibly advocates for the rule of law, more social justice and better democracy. Some of the opposition parties have been discredited since their former reign. Currently, right-wing populists and right-wing extremists are the main alternatives.

This development in Slovakia is similar to that of most other central and southeastern EU countries. Many observers in Slovakia now fear that, over the long term, their country could move towards a political situation similar to that in Hungary or Poland.

The public outside Slovakia and European politicians are not yet sufficiently aware of the background behind the Kuciak murder case and its possible political implications. What is now happening in Slovakia should be a warning signal —  a reason to look very carefully at current developments in Slovakia, and to support the civil democracy movement.

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Source: http://www.dw.com/en/opinion-warning-signal-for-europe-from-slovakia/a-42923586

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The EU’s top court on Wednesday dismissed a challenge by Slovakia and Hungary over the bloc’s mandatory refugee quota program, an issue that has divided eastern European states from other members.

The European Court of Justice upheld the EU’s right to order national governments to take in their fair share of asylum seekers, arguing that “the mechanism actually contributes to enabling Greece and Italy to deal with the impact of the 2015 migration crisis and is proportionate.”

The ruling means that Hungary and Slovakia could face fines if they refuse to abide by the quota system.
The mandatory quota system was approved in September 2015 by a majority of EU member states, but was rejected by Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Romania and Hungary. Poland supported the plan, but later strongly opposed it when the right-wing PiS government came to power.

Unanimous decision not required
The burden sharing agreement was struck despite the EU’s so-called Dublin rules, which requires immigrants to apply for asylum in their country of first arrival.

Slovakia and Hungary argued the EU broke its own rules and exceeded its powers when it approved the quota system with a “qualified majority,” or about two-thirds vote.

The ECJ said in its ruling that the EU “was not required to act unanimously when it adopted the contested decision.”

The legal challenge was also backed by Poland, which alongside Hungary has not taken in any asylum seekers. Slovakia and the Czech Republic have only taken in a handful. All four countries also say migrants will disrupt their societies and the EU’s focus should be on protecting its external borders.

EU praises court decision
The European Commission, the EU executive, welcomed the ECJ ruling.

“ECJ confirms relocation scheme valid. Time to work in unity and implement solidarity in full,” said EU Migration Commissioner Dimitris Avramopoulos.

German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel said that the ruling means eastern European members must abide by the refugee sharing scheme.

“I always said to our eastern European partners that it is right to clarify questions legally if there is doubt. But now we can expect all European partners to stick to the ruling and implement the agreements without delay,” Gabriel said in a statement.

Slovakia said that it accepted the top court decision but it was still against the refugee scheme.

“Our position on quotas does not change,” Prime Minister Robert Fico said. “We will continue to work on having solidarity expressed in different ways other than forcing (on us) migrants from other countries that don’t want to be here anyway.”

In Budapest, Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto called the court’s decision “outrageous and irresponsible.”

“This decision jeopardises the security and future of all of Europe,” he told a press conference, adding that the decion was political. “Politics has raped European law and values,” he said.

Quota scheme unfulfilled
Only 24,000 of 160,000 refugees from Greece and Italy have been transferred to other states under the EU’s refugee burden sharing policy. Under the policy, Hungary is required to take in 1,294 refugees and Slovakia 902.

The European Commission is also carrying out legal action against the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland for refusing to implement the EU directive.

The ECJ ruling is a victory for western European states like Germany, France and Italy, who have pushed for EU “solidarity” over the migration issue.

Nearly 1.7 million migrants have arrived in the EU from the Middle East and Africa since 2014. Migration flows have slowed since 2016, when the so-called Balkan route was largely closed and an EU migration deal with Turkey brought boat crossing to Greece down to a trickle. The EU has meanwhile sought to reduce migrant crossings from Libya.

Source: http://www.dw.com/en/refugee-crisis-european-court-of-justice-rejects-quota-challenge/a-40375192

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