Ireland vows to make refugee plan work

The Government has said it will work to make the EU's refugee relocation scheme a success, after it emerged that Ireland has been offered just 20 asylum seekers under the initiative.

The latest signs of problems with the programme came as European Council president Donald Tusk issued a stark warning that the European Union had "no more than two months" to tackle the migration crisis facing the bloc or else face the collapse of the passport-free Schengen zone.

The Government agreed to accept 2,600 asylum seekers under the relocation scheme, which was designed to ease pressure on Greece and Italy by dispersing new arrivals across EU states.

Obstacles

But political and logistical obstacles, as well as low take-up, have resulted in just 322 people being relocated to date across the 28-state EU. A Syrian family, due to arrive from Greece later this month, will be the first asylum seekers to come to Ireland under the programme.

As of last Monday, 17 EU states had made available 4,237 places for asylum seekers out of the 160,000 that are supposed to be relocated, according to the European Commission.

A spokesman for the Department of Justice said it expected more people would be offered to Ireland as the scheme developed.

“We have informed our European counterparts of our capacity and readiness to accept people under the agreement.

“In the meantime Ireland will continue to work with EU partners to make the relocation programme a success and to actively contribute to ongoing discussions at EU level on these important issues,” the spokesman said.

Mr Tusk issued his warning to the European Parliament in Strasbourg amid growing frustration in Brussels and Germany that the EU seems unable to get its act together on its worst displacement crisis since the second World War.

Grave consequences

“We have no more than two months to get things under control,” Mr Tusk, who chairs the summits of EU leaders, said. “The March European Council [summit] will be the last moment to see if our strategy works. If it doesn’t, we will face grave consequences such as the collapse of Schengen.”

The council summit on March 17th-18th will focus mainly on the migrant issue.

Asked whether, given the slow pace of relocation from Greece and Italy, the Government could raise its intake commitment under a separate resettlement scheme, the Department of Justice spokesman said the commitment to take in 2,600 people for relocation was binding and could not be unilaterally altered.

Meanwhile, a report by Médecins Sans Frontières denounced the EU’s “catastrophic” failure to respond to the humanitarian needs of refugees, asylum seekers and migrants last year.

It said the bloc’s focus on deterrence and a chaotic response to humanitarian needs worsened the conditions of thousands of vulnerable people.