Luxembourg, 25/10/2012 (Agence Europe) - At their meeting in Luxembourg on Thursday 25 October, EU27 interior ministers put pressure on the Balkan States, some of whose passport-holders had been abusing the EU's asylum system, by threatening to suspend the visa facilitating scheme if the Balkan nations' governments fail to cooperate properly. On their arrival in Luxembourg, where some ministers had been unable to land due to fog and had had to go back home again (like French interior minister Manuel Valls), Swedish interior minister Tobias Billström took a strong line, saying that everyone has to carry out their responsibilities before joining the European Union and one of these responsibilities is to improve living standards for minorities. He was referring to the fate of the Roma, who are arriving en masse in the EU27 through the visa-free travel schemes.
Five Balkans states were granted visa-free travel in the EU in 2009 and 2010, namely Serbia, Macedonia, Albania, Montenegro and Bosnia Herzegovina, in a gesture of openness to countries which might join the EU one day. The problem, as six interior ministers pointed out in a letter to Commissioner Cecilia Malmström and the Cypriot Presidency recently, is that more and more visa-free short-term visitors to the Schengen Area are requesting asylum when they get here, with EU sources talking on Wednesday of a 60% increase in the number of asylum requests being made by people from the five Balkan states since January 2012 alone. German interior minister Hans-Peter Friedrich said in an interview with French newspaper Le Figaro on Thursday (along with French interior minister Français Manuel Valls) that Serbia and Macedonia were the worst culprits.
The European Commission played for time and said at the end of August in its third assessment of the visa-free travel schemes that abuse of the asylum system was geographically limited and subject to seasonal peaks, but the tone has changed in recent weeks. The Commission is now talking about a worrying situation that has got worse since the summer. Figures quoted by Commission spokesperson Michele Cercone suggest that 5,000 requests for asylum have been lodged in Germany by people from the five Balkans countries in question since 1 January 2012, most of them being viewed as unjustified. Friedrich said requests from Serbian passport-holders had trebled in September (on the previous month) and the number of requests lodged by Macedonians had increased by 70%.
A European source said that one of the concerns was the way this was an organised phenomenon with buses of people, most of them Roma, arriving in Europe to request asylum. This was mentioned by the French and German ministers in their joint interview, both of them calling on the governments of the Balkan states to do more to help the Roma and provide them with what they need so that they stay at home.
On Thursday, German secretary of state for the interior, Ole Schröder, who attended the meeting in Luxembourg, said all of Germany's asylum capabilities were needed for people who genuinely need aid, particularly given the situation in Syria and Afghanistan and it is unacceptable to have twice as many asylum-seekers from Serbia than from Afghanistan, which shows how ridiculous the situation is, particularly because Serbia wants to join the EU. The European Commission suggested a safeguard clause in May 2011 to allow temporary suspension of the visa-free travel schemes if systematic abuse is detected. Interior ministers issued their point of view in December 2011 and are now only awaiting endorsement from the European Parliament, which is not opposed to the idea of a safeguard clause, but wants the question of visa reciprocity to be discussed first. The interior ministers want to have the safeguard clause by the end of the year. (SP/transl.fl)