EU sees hotspots as key to dealing with refugee crisis

In EU- speak they’re called “hotspots” — teams of European border, legal and asylum experts considered key to identifying those in need of international protection among the tens of thousands of people arriving in Greece and Italy in search of sanctuary or better lives.

Yet many are wondering when they will be put in place, how they will operate and whether they will provide the magic solution Europe needs.

For the moment, these task forces are the only hope the European Union has to quickly respond to the unfolding humanitarian emergency, the biggest refugee crisis it has faced in decades.

Without them, EU attempts to ease the pressure on Greece and Italy by distributing 160,000 refugees among other nations over the next two years cannot get off the ground.

Still, few seem to understand exactly what they are, and despite the urgent need for their deployment, the teams are not likely to be fully operational until November at best.

In a nutshell, hotspots are made up of experts from the Frontex border agency, the European Asylum Support Office, the EU’s police and justice agencies — Europol and Eurojust — and representatives from the bloc’s anti- smuggler operation in the Mediterranean.

Once summoned by a country under heavy migration pressure, these experts could be quickly deployed to identify, register, fingerprint and screen people for criminal backgrounds as well as to better understand the routes they use to get to Europe.

The idea is to identify people who are fleeing conflict or violence and thus have the right to asylum or some other form of protection, as opposed to those who have come to Europe in search of jobs and better lives, and who don’t.

It means that potential refugees will know sooner whether they can stay, and filter out those who must go home.

Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi welcomed the plan as a European, rather than a national, solution to a challenge that has implications for the entire 28- nation bloc.

“This is very important for us because for the first time the migrant question is not simply a question of the single member states. It’s a question about all European people and particularly all European institutions,” he said Thursday.

Italy and Greece have been so overwhelmed by the flood of people that in many cases their reception centres have been unable to register them. Bulgaria is also considering whether to call for hotspots along its border with Turkey, which has become a temporary home to almost two million refugees.

The EU teams will work with national authorities in Greece and Italy to speed up the process and ensure common standards are applied. They will also bring language and cultural skills that local officials might not have.

The system benefits the authorities too, by allowing justice and police agencies to share intelligence.

Some work has already begun. EU experts have been operating out of a headquarters in Catania in southern Italy since July. Italian anti- terror and anti- mafia officials are also involved. Tiny Lampedusa island, closer to Libya than to Italy, is expected to be the first hotspot to start operating, in part because it has been handling migrants rescued at sea for several years.

Greece’s headquarters is in the port of Piraeus in Athens. Smaller mobile teams would deploy to the Aegean Islands.

Despite the costs of managing the huge flow of people, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said the potential benefits from their arrival far outweigh any dangers.

“The opportunities are much bigger than the risks, we just have to recognize and use them,” she said Thursday.

For the first time the migrant question is not simply a question of the single member states. It’s a question about all European people.