European governments have forced through a deal to impose refugee quotas, sharing 120,000 people between them in a watershed decision that several states bitterly opposed.



The decision to overrule opponents in the newer states of central Europe was highly unusual and perceived as an assault on their sovereignty by the four countries that voted against.

While applauded by NGOs and immigration professionals as a belated attempt by the EU to get to grips with its biggest ever migration crisis, the decision was highly divisive and sets the scene for a tense summit of EU leaders in Brussels on Wednesday dedicated to the refugee emergency.

Our duty in central Europe is to show compassion to refugees | Letter from Bronisław Komorowski and others Read more

After a months-long battle that the UN warned was a threat to European unity, the continent’s interior ministers finally decided to agree to the principle of sharing refugees between member states in the first meaningful move towards a common EU policy on asylum seekers.

But the Czech Republic, Hungary, Romania and Slovakia all voted against a mandatory quota, while Poland deserted its regional allies to side with a decision pushed by Germany and France.

The defeated four expressed resentment at what they perceive as western – and especially German – bullying. Slovakian and Czech politicians reacted with anger to a move they claim will alter the fabric of European society. Germany thanked Poland for breaking ranks with its fellow central Europeans.

Britain has refused to take part in the scheme, having separately promised to resettle 4,000 refugees this year and 20,000 over five years – the first few of whom arrived on Tuesday, the UK government announced without giving details.

Refugee crisis: EU summit amid resentment over quota deal – live Read more

Of the 120,000 to be divided between the remaining EU states, resettled from Italy and Greece, 66,000 are to be shared initially and the rest a year later. The nine countries of central and eastern Europe are being asked to take only about 15,000 of the total between them, while Germany and France between them will take double that. But the Slovakian PM, Robert Fico, said the vote was unprecedented in EU history and vowed to defy it. “As long as I am prime minister, mandatory quotas will not be implemented on Slovak territory,” Fico told MPs in Bratislava.

The Czech government had earlier warned that any attempt to impose such a scheme would be unworkable and could end in “big ridicule” for governments and EU authorities. The country’s interior minister, Milan Chovanec, tweeted after the vote: “We will soon realise that the emperor has no clothes. Common sense lost today.”

The victors applauded the move, which the French interior minister, Bernard Cazeneuve, called a “testament to the capacity of Europe to take responsibility and progress”.

Latest developments in Europe's refugee crisis – a visual guide Read more

Hungary, the EU’s toughest anti-immigration government, said it accepted the decision, but questioned the feasibility. Zoltán Kovács, a government spokesman, said: “We believe it will be impossible to keep people assigned to, say, Slovakia if they want to go to Germany. How do you keep people in one country if they want to go join their relatives who live in another EU country or want the more favourable social welfare benefits in that country?”

Refugee advocates welcomed the decision but questioned the ability of new quotas to meaningfully deal with a wave of migration that already quadruples the numbers covered by the deal. UN officials praised Europe’s politicians for finally having the political courage to agree to the principle of sharing the burden. Peter Sutherland, the UN’s special representative for international migration, said: “The principle is so important and reflects such a change of thinking that in itself this is a very significant development.”

But he and his colleagues also warned that the number of refugees the EU has agreed to share is far too small.

Carlotta Sami, a spokeswoman for the UN refugee agency, UNHCR, said: “The relocation plan in itself will not be sufficient to solve the crisis. It’s just 120,000 over two years. Considering that as of today almost 480,000 people have arrived [in Europe this year by boat], and 84% are coming from refugee-producing countries, this is clearly not enough. The EU states will have to … increase the numbers.”

But the 120,000, plus a further 40,000 already agreed, does not represent the total number of immigrants who will be admitted by the EU, simply the number that will be subject to transnational quotas. About 1 million newcomers are expected to arrive in Germany alone this year. There is no suggestion that those beyond Germany’s quota will not be admitted.

The issue of the 120,000 became a crucial contest because, along with the previous agreement to share 40,000, it was the first time an attempt had been made to agree quotas across the EU. Ambassadors from the 28 EU states spent the last three days drafting a 39-page deal for the governments, but key issues remained open amid deep divisions.

A summit of EU leaders on migration is being held on Wednesday in Brussels at the behest of Angela Merkel, the German chancellor. The leaders did not want their summit to be hijacked by an unseemly squabble over quotas and ordered the interior ministers to strike a deal. Theresa May, the British home secretary, declared that “we need, as Europe, to get on with the job”, while stressing that the UK would not take part in any refugee-sharing scheme.

Uniquely in the EU, Britain has refused to join in the resettlement and has a legal exemption. Ireland and Denmark also have opt-outs, but are offering to participate.

EU governments have been battling over the policy since May as the numbers arriving have risen drastically, resulting in Hungary building fences on its borders and authorising the army to use teargas and rubber bullets against refugees.

Germany unilaterally opened its doors to Syrians last month before backtracking and reasserting national border controls in the middle of Europe’s free-travel Schengen area. On Tuesday the German rail operator, Deutsche Bahn, announced it was halting services to Austria and Hungary until 4 October.

Apart from the fight over quotas, much of Tuesday’s negotiations focused on how to keep people out through quicker deportation procedures, the faster screening and fingerprinting of those arriving on the EU’s southern borders, and helping neighbouring countries in the Balkans and the Middle East, notably Turkey, to stop people heading for the EU.

The latter prevention and pre-emption strategies will also preoccupy Wednesday’s summit. The policies presuppose substantial increases in staffing and resources for EU police and border agencies and the ceding of national authority over borders to the same EU agencies, none of which is proceeding very quickly.

It remains to be seen how the decision to force a vote on one of the most toxic issues in European politics will play out.

On Monday evening the Croatian president, Kolinda Grabar-Kitarović, accused Merkel of causing the chaos in central Europe through her policy flip-flops, first declaring that Germany’s doors were open to Syrians and then, when the stampede for Germany got under way, reversing that and instituting national border controls with Austria.

The Polish government, which dropped its opposition to quotas in the vote, is likely to be kicked out of office next month, replaced by rightwing nationalists who are much tougher on immigration and have been delivering alarmist statements about sharia law in parts of the EU.

















