The refugee problem in Europe isn’t quite so simple as western Europe accepting immigrants in droves and eastern Europe refusing them.
Such interpretations, as expressed in Rachel Miller’s story “Refugee crisis splits Eastern and Western Europe,” which appeared Sept. 9 in the IDS, are very simplified.
Just look at the events in Calais, France, this summer when the United Kingdom was against accepting migrants on its territory — some died while trying to enter the country.
The Czech Republic is willing to accept the refugees, but it argues mandatory quotas are not a solution to the refugee crisis.
The Czech Republic also said the Schengen Treaty was mutually exclusive with the quotas, as many asylum-seekers apply in Germany and would likely seek to immigrate there illegally if they are deferred to the Czech Republic.
It would be difficult, if not impossible, to keep them in a country that would not be the country of their choice because there are no patrolled borders inside the Schengen.
By the way, Slovakia is helping Austria by accepting many refugees from the overfilled Austrian camps.
The Czech Republic sent envoys to the camps in the Middle East to prepare to relocate 400 refugees, among them families of Syrian children they are already treating in the Czech hospitals, and dispatched envoys to the camps in Italy and Greece to transport another 1,500 refugees to the Czech Republic, which has a population of 10 million.
Germany withdrew its plan to lower the income tax next year and intends to accept almost one million immigrants and refugees in the near future. Volunteers come from all over the EU to help migrants on the EU borders.
This summer more than 170,000 migrants crossed the border to Hungary, which has a population of 10 million.
The asylum seekers should first register in Hungary — or any other Schengen border country — but many of them refuse to do so because they fear they would not be allowed to apply for asylum in Germany.
Of course, it is unacceptable to use violence against people seeking asylum, as expressed in “Violence against refugees in the EU” by Emma Wenninger, published Sept. 17.
On the other hand, asylum seekers should abstain from violence, too.
Some Hungarian policemen had to be treated for injuries after migrants began to dismantle the wall in an attempt to cross the Hungarian-Serbian border and threw rocks and plastic bottles with water on the police.
There are crossing points at the border to Hungary where asylum seekers can enter the country and register, even without any documents.
For three months only, the EU countries registered 213,200 applicants for asylum, which includes 44,000 Syrian and 27,000 Afghan refugees.
But what about those millions of Syrian refugees in the overcrowded camps in Lebanon, Jordan or Turkey?
Those who do not have money to pay smugglers to get them to Europe also deserve attention and help.
Marta Kiripolska
Visiting scholar
Bloomington, Indiana
