EU ministers agree to resettle 120K refugees
LONDON — Over the strong objections of some, government ministers from the European Union voted Tuesday to resettle 120,000 refugees, distributing them across the continent but making only a small dent in Europe’s huge migrant crisis.
The decision at a meeting in Brussels came through an extremely rare majority vote, rather than a full consensus, of the interior ministers from the EU’s 28 member states, attesting to the deep divisions over the issue.
Dissenting were several former Soviet bloc countries: Hungary, the Czech Republic, Romania and Slovakia, according to the Czech minister. Finland abstained.
Under the plan, the asylum seekers, mostly from Syria and Iraq, would be distributed across the EU, with Germany, France and Spain taking the most.
But how the refugees could be compelled to remain in their designated countries, given the free, passport-less movement of people throughout much of the continent, was unclear. Most of the migrants arriving in Europe prefer to claim asylum in the richer countries of Germany and Scandinavia.
The number involved represents only a small portion of the nearly half-million migrants who have poured into Europe from war-torn and poverty-stricken countries in the Middle East, Asia and Africa this year. Germany has already pledged to accept up to 800,000 asylum seekers. WASHINGTON — When Ben Carson said Sunday he would not want to see a Muslim elected president, he did not just reignite a volatile conversation about the role of Islam in American life — he also exposed another fissure between many Republican leaders and elements of the party’s grassroots.
In the years since former President George W. Bush sought to separate the Islamic extremists behind the Sept. 11 attacks from the millions of practitioners of what he called a religion “of peace,” many in his party have come to reject the distinction.
It is hardly the only point of disagreement between Republican leaders who are determined to reorient the party to win in a changing country and activists who are uneasy about what they see as threats to their way of life. But the debate over Islam is particularly worrisome for Republicans because it so vividly highlights the vacuum that has been created by the absence of a unifying leader who can temper the impulses of the rank-and-file.
“The conservative movement needs a pope,” said Matt Lewis, a conservative writer. “Whether it was William F. Buckley writing the Birchers out of the movement or George W. Bush using his voice and office to speak out about Islam, we need people who, like them, will take leadership positions.”
“We would’ve preferred to have adoption by consensus, but we did not manage to achieve that. But it was not for want of trying,” said Jean Asselborn, the foreign and European affairs minister from Luxembourg, which currently holds the rotating EU presidency.
“We are in an emergency situation,” Asselborn added. “The EU is accused of not moving quickly enough in its decisions, so we had to adopt this legal decision today on the relocation of 120,000 people . . . If we had not done this, Europe would have been even more divided, and its credibility would have been even more undermined.”
He said pointedly that he expected all countries, including the objectors, to abide by the decision, as expected under the rules of EU membership. The Slovakian prime minister was reported to have declared after the meeting that his country would refuse to participate in the resettlement plan.
Last week, the ministers agreed on a previous proposal to distribute 40,000 refugees. Tuesday’s decision would raise the total to 160,000.
The aim is relieve the burden on front-line member states, such as Greece and Italy, that have borne the brunt of the influx of migrants arriving by sea.
The new plan is expected to be ratified Wednesday at an emergency summit of the leaders of all 28 EU countries.