Serbia, one of the countries that foreigners cross to reach Western Europe, demanded that the EU put aside the differences and defined a joint answer.
Serbian Foreign Minister Ivica Dacic said some EU countries let refugee enter, while others lift walls and close borders to prevent foreigners from entering.
“Should we build walls too?” the foreign minister asked, adding that “the EU should give a joint answer to the arrival of more than one and a half million undocumented people that are trying to escape from war and abject poverty in their countries of origin.”
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan held meetings on Monday with European authorities to coordinate how to face the crisis, considered the worst since World War II.
In statements to the media, the president reminded the EU that, “Turkey accepts on its own around 2,500,000 Syrian and Iraqi refugees and it has invested more than $7,000,000 USD.”
He added that, “after assuming that responsibility for years, they are open to all kinds of aid in that reference.”
European Commission (EC) President Jean Claude Juncker said he would try to establish a common migration agenda with Ankara to collaborate to solve the crisis.
European Council President Donald Tusk considered that the situation of hundreds of people that are emigrating to the EU through Turkey should be stopped and we cannot do it alone.
“We need the Turkish side and increasing cooperation will benefit both sides,” he asserted.
In a meeting in Geneva, European Commission Vice President Frans Timmermans asserted that, “one of the main challenges to the bloc, faced with this problem was to make the public opinion understand that immigration is beneficial to the societies that accept it.”
According to the community representative, Europeans fell that their social status is threatened, faced with the wave of immigrants and fear ethnic, religious and cultural differences.
Thus, it is necessary to fight those beliefs, said Timmermans, a stance that was supported by the director of the International Organization for Migrations, William Swing and UN High Commissioner for Refugees Antonio Guterres.
According to Swing, “we have to help people to overcome their fears, to go beyond stereotypes and the fear of losing their identities and what we need is to foster the culture of interests and shared values.”
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