Politico — European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker wants to put the EU’s southern frontier in all but name in Macedonia, not Greece.
In a letter sent Monday, Juncker backed Slovenia’s proposal for EU support to reinforce the Macedonian border with Greece to stem the northward flow of migrants. Under this plan, most migrants who got to Greece would stay in place, taking pressure off transfer countries but eventually also from Austria and Germany.
“I welcome your suggestion,” Juncker wrote to Slovenia’s Prime Minister Miro Cerar, assuring him of the Commission’s support for his plan for all EU countries to “provide assistance to the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia authorities to support controls on the border with Greece through the secondment of police/law enforcement officers, and the provision of equipment.” POLITICO saw a copy of the letter.
As Macedonia isn’t a member of the EU, Juncker said EU countries would have to reach bilateral agreements with the government in Skopje to dispatch police to the border with Greece. The rules in place for the EU’s border protection agency only allowed for missions within the EU, not for the “deployment of officers in the framework of a Frontex joint operation on the territory of a third country.”
Juncker’s proposals for strengthening Frontex, made last December, would address this “shortcoming,” as Juncker said, and pave the way for Frontex missions outside EU territory.
In the letter, Juncker said countries along the Western Balkan migration route, whether EU members or not, must stop “waving through refugees without informing a neighbouring country,” which is “not acceptable.”
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Greece has been harshly criticised by Germany and Austria, who warned that it could be excluded from the Schengen zone unless it did more to control its southern as well as northern borders.
Juncker stated that access to countries all along the route should be denied to those not eligible for asylum or international protection. With regard to migrants who have already made it to Europe, EU states “and non-EU countries on the Western Balkans route should also actively prevent third-country nationals from leaving their territory in an unauthorised manner by crossing the border outside the border crossing points, or before their legal status is determined,” he said.
Greece’s minister for migration, Ioannis Mouzalas, told the Financial Times Monday that Athens had not been consulted on the Slovenian plan.
