INTL EU Refugee/Migration Crises - News Only Thread for September 2015

[Melodi]

OK I'm going to start this but everyone feel free to contribute - this is a news only thread and is only for the situation in the EU/Middle East - BEWell has a great thread for the US stuff but at the moment we have three active threads on immigration and being an emotional issue the comments tend to take over.

So this is mostly a news only thread with a slight change - posters are free to make a short comment when they post if they think it is relevant but please have a news story to go with it; Op-Ed pieces from the press or internet are fine - but mostly lets keep this to news updates.

I will do my best to keep up with the other threads and look for stories that answer questions that come up there.

I'll start this with the current top story on the BBC website - everyone feel free to drop your stories here, but any comments need to brief and have a news story attached - lets see how that works!

Melodi

Migrant crisis 'a German problem' - Hungary's Orban

Media caption Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban: "The (migrant) problem is not a European problem. The problem is a German problem."
Migrant surge

Hungary's leader says the migrant crisis facing Europe is a "German problem" since Germany is where those arriving in the EU "would like to go".

PM Viktor Orban said Hungary would not allow migrants to leave its territory without registering.

His comments came as Hungarian authorities opened the main rail station in Budapest to hundreds of migrants after a two-day stand-off.

But international services from the station were indefinitely suspended.

EU rules place responsibility for assessing asylum claims on the country where a migrant first arrives.

Many of the migrants currently in Hungary have been refusing to register there, in order to continue their journeys to Germany before seeking asylum.

The migrants stuck at Budapest's Keleti station were prevented from boarding trains on Tuesday and Wednesday. Some were involved in scuffles with police.

They had bought tickets after Hungary briefly appeared to abandon efforts to register migrants on Monday, allowing huge numbers to board trains to Vienna and southern Germany.

After the station opened on Thursday morning, a message on an announcement board said international tickets would be accepted on national trains.

One train carrying migrants departed, but stopped near a migrant reception centre at Bicske, about 40km (25 miles) west of Budapest. Police then began to take the migrants - some of whom shouted "No camp, no camp" - off the train.

Media caption The BBC's Nick Thorpe at Keleti station in Budapest: "People are running across the square and climbing up the steps to the railway station"

The number of migrants entering Europe has reached record levels, with 107,500 arriving in July alone. Germany expects to take in 800,000 migrants this year - four times last year's total.

The surge in numbers has created tension and disagreement over EU migration policy. Germany has been prepared to accept large numbers of asylum seekers, but other countries have not.

Mr Orban, who heads the anti-immigrant Fidesz party and was in Brussels for talks, said border control was "the number one issue".

"Hungarians are full of fear," he said. "People of Europe full of fear because they see that the European leaders, among them the prime ministers, are not able to control the situation."

During a tense press conference with European Parliament President Martin Schulz, the Hungarian leader said that "nobody would like to stay in Hungary, neither in Slovakia nor Poland nor Estonia.

"All of them would like to go to Germany," he said. "Our job is only to register them."

Media caption European Parliament president: The migrant crisis "could lead to a deeper split of the European Union"

Mr Schulz countered: "What we are seeing for the time being is egoism instead of common European sense.

"To say 'yeah, you know we have refugees all over in Europe but they all want to go to Germany and therefore we are not concerned' is effective, but wrong. And therefore I think we need a fair and just distribution."

European Council president Donald Tusk said on Thursday that EU countries should accept at least 100,000 asylum seekers between them, a sharp increase on a previous European Commission target of 40,000.

EU states instead so far committed to sharing some 32,000 asylum seekers from Italy and Greece.

He also took Mr Orban to task for comments in which the Hungarian leader said his country was being "overrun" with refugees who threatened to undermine Europe's Christian roots.

Mr Tusk said: "Referring to Christianity in a public debate on migration must mean in the first place the readiness to show solidarity and sacrifice."

Jean Asselborn, Luxembourg's foreign minister, said all EU countries should have the capacity to absorb refugees.

"The EU's values must be valid through the union. No-one can say we don't want Muslims or blacks," he told German daily Sueddeutsche Zeitung.

The human cost of the crisis was also put into sharp focus on Wednesday when five children were among 12 migrants who drowned in Turkish waters while trying to reach Greece.

Images of the washed-up body of a three-year-old boy, who died alongside his mother and five-year-old brother, circulated widely on social media.


The word migrant is defined in the Oxford English Dictionary as "one who moves, either temporarily or permanently, from one place, area, or country of residence to another".

A refugee is, according to the 1951 Refugee Convention, any person who "owing to a well-founded fear" of persecution is outside their country of nationality and "unable" or "unwilling" to seek the protection of that country. To gain the status, one has to go through the legal process of claiming asylum.

The word migrant has traditionally been considered a neutral term, but some criticise the BBC and other media for using a word they say implies something voluntary, and should not be applied to people fleeing danger.

Battle over words to describe migrants
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-34136823

 

[Melodi]

From the UK - understand that the English remember being evacuated from London during WWII and taking in "Vacees" so they have a different memory of taking in refugees than most of Europe (where people walked the roads in starving masses). This is from the UK Independent .


Refugees Welcome campaign: Leading politicians and tens of thousands back The Independent's campaign - so when will David Cameron act?

Images of dead Syrian child Aylan Kurdi spark outcry over UK's treatment of people fleeing war-torn countries
Matt Dathan and Heather Saul

Thursday 03 September 2015
[famous photo I am not reposting of dead child here]
Political leaders across the spectrum are backing The Independent's campaign demanding David Cameron do more to help refugees - as tens of thousands signed our petition after the publication of images of dead Syrian child Aylan Kurdi.

Former Conservative Cabinet minister Baroness Warsi has joined a number of prominent figures telling the Prime Minister he "can do more", in the wake of the powerful images' emergence.

Harriet Harman, Labour's acting leader, has written to the Mr Cameron demanding he “stop dragging his feet” and calling on him to hold an urgent meeting of the Government’s emergency Cobra committee.

She is also urging him to demand an summit of EU leaders to work out a response to the growing humanitarian crisis that is overflowing into Europe.

"It is high time Britain starting living up to its international responsibilities and proud tradition of helping those who need it most," a Labour party source told The Independent.

Leading figures from Labour, the Liberal Democrats, the SNP and the Green party demanded the Government take immediate action and abandon its stubborn refusal to take in more than just a few hundred Syrian refugees.

A Syrian family fleeing their war-torn country, just some of four million Syrians who have fled since civil war broke out in 2011 A Syrian family fleeing their war-torn country, just some of four million Syrians who have fled since civil war broke out in 2011 After sending the photographs of Aylan Kurdi to the Prime Minister, Downing Street responded by telling The Independent that Britain is already doing enough to help refugees.

The Independent chose to publish the image of the toddler in an effort to highlight the scale of suffering and death endured by millions of desperate men, women and children risking their lives to flee war torn countries.

The accompanying petition urges the Government to stop relying on the Dublin regulation as an excuse not to take in Britain’s fair share of refugees.

It has already received more than 30,000 signatures and has been backed by leading voices in British politics, including Nicola Sturgeon, Jeremy Corbyn, David Miliband, Labour Mayoral candidates Tessa Jowell and Sadiq Khan and Green MP Caroline Lucas.

The Prime Minister has previously been criticised for describing refugees coming to the UK as a “swarm”, and later said he would not “allow people to break into our country”. Philip Hammond echoed this rhetoric by accusing refugees of “marauding” around Calais.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/p...-so-when-will-david-cameron-act-10484022.html

 

[Melodi]

Desperate migrants storm train at Budapest's main station after police withdraw
Independent.ie Newsdesk Twitter

Email

Published
03/09/2015 | 08:05

A child cries as nigrants try to board a train at the railway station in Budapest, Hungary, Thursday, Sept. 3, 2015. Over 150,000 migrants have reached Hungary this year, most coming through the southern border with Serbia, and many apply for asylum but quickly try to leave for richer EU countries.(AP Photo/Frank Augstein)

Migrants poured into Budapest's main railway station on Thursday after Hungarian police withdrew following a two-day standoff, triggering chaotic scenes.

Hundreds stormed a train, cramming children through open windows in the belief they might travel west to Austria and Germany. Hungary's main railway operator, however, said there were no direct trains leaving to western Europe.

"Attention please, on Track 8 the train does not depart. Please get off the train," the station said over intercom.

There was no immediate word about why the police withdrew.

Over 2,000 migrants, many of them refugees from conflicts in the Middle East and Africa, had been camped in front of the Keleti Railway Terminus, closed to them by authorities saying European Union rules bar travel by those without valid documents.

The standoff has become the latest symbol of Europe's migration crisis, the continent's worst since the Yugoslav wars of the 1990s.

The police withdrawal at the station coincided with the start of a special parliamentary session to debate tightening migration laws and punishment for those caught trying to breach a 3.5-metre high fence Hungary is building on its border with Serbia.

Senior ruling party lawmaker Gergely Gulyas said the amendments could be passed this week and cut the number of illegal border crossings to "zero" by mid-September.

Desperate migrants storm train at Budapest's main station after police withdraw

Migrants pour on to trains at Budapest, but services to western Europe suspended
Migrants storm into a train at the Keleti train station in Budapest, Hungary, September 3, 2015 as Hungarian police withdrew from the gates after two days of blocking their entry. REUTERS/Laszlo Balogh


Reuters

 

[mzkitty]

Thanks, Melodi. Let's post this one just so everyone knows:


31m
Turkish government to repatriate bodies of Aylan Kurdi, child found on Turkish beach, his mother and brother to Kobani, Syria - @FergalKeane
End of alert

 

[Melodi]

Thanks, Melodi. Let's post this one just so everyone knows:


31m
Turkish government to repatriate bodies of Aylan Kurdi, child found on Turkish beach, his mother and brother to Kobani, Syria - @FergalKeane
End of alert

Your welcome MzKitty - and thank you for the update..

From the UK Guardian (probably the most liberal of the on-line mainstream papers keep that in mind)....

Hungarian police stop train on way to Austrian border

Train was first to leave Budapest since police blockade ended while move raises concern people were taken to refugee camp

Dan Nolan and Emma Graham-Harrison in Budapest and agencies

Thursday 3 September 2015 12.54 BST

Hungarian police have stopped a train bound for towns near the Austrian border, sparking fears that the migrants and refugees on board were being made to go to a camp nearby.

The train had left Budapest’s Keleti (Eastern) station on Thursday morning, and was the first to depart after the end of a two-day police blockade that prompted up to 3,000 people trying to travel to western Europe to camp outside.

However the train, bound for Sopron near Hungary’s border with Austria, was halted by scores of riot police at the town of Bicske, an hour from Budapest, where one of Hungary’s four main refugee camps is located. Passengers deemed to be migrants were ordered to disembark. Some refused, instead banging on the windows shouting “No camp, no camp!”

TV news footage showed dozens of people lying on the train tracks to protest at being taken to the nearby refugee camp. One family – a man, his wife and their toddler – had to be wrestled off the ground by a dozen riot police, according to a Reuters reporter at the scene.It took a dozen riot police to get them up, a Reuters reporter at the scene said.

Other migrants caught in the train station underpass pushed back dozens of riot police blocking the top of the stairs to fight their way back on board the train, which remained stationary in high temperatures. Passengers reportedly had no access to water.

Earlier at Keleti station, bewildered and exhausted-looking families with young children, many of whom have been camped out for days in a makeshift refugee camp below the station, sought information about when they could travel. People were carrying luggage and fathers carried young children on their shoulders.

One would-be passenger, Waleed, 40, from Syria, said: “I have been travelling for 24 days. I paid 200,000 Syrian pounds (£695) to leave Syria. Why? Because I escaped from war, bombs, bullets. Why is there no train?”

A statement from Hungarian Railways (MAV) said: “In the interests of rail travel security the company has decided that until further notice, direct train services from Budapest to western Europe will not be in service.”

An MAV spokesman told state news agency MTI that “passengers wanting to travel to western Europe can only take trains leaving from the northern and western borders and with an external rail company”.

Refugees including young children sit on the tracks at Keleti station in Budapest. Photograph: Peter Kohalmi/AFP/Getty Images

Police officers who remained at Keleti station expressed uncertainty over what would happen next. In answer to the question: “Does admitting migrants into the station mean that the train will depart soon, or are the police also unclear what to do in the coming hours?”, a police officer replied: “The second part of the sentence is correct.”

Muhammad, a 25-year-old university student from Damascus who left Syria a month ago, was among those experiencing the chaos at Keleti. “We don’t want to take the trains because we are worried they will catch us and take our fingerprints at the border,” he said.

Muhammad told the Guardian he lost everything except the clothes on his back on a journey that included three terrifying hours in the Mediterranean when the dingy he was travelling in between Greece and Turkey capsized.

He was robbed of most of his money by a human trafficker and now has only a ticket to Germany that he can’t use. There is food for the families and kids, he said, tousling a young boy’s hair affectionately, but not much for the rest of us.

He did not want to give his last name for fear it could put family still in Syria at risk.

Many of the travellers are in family groups. Some kids are playing football on the platform but tempers are fraying in the heat and confusion and at least one young boy walked past in tears.

Keleti has become the focus of the migration crisis in Europe, as an estimated 3,000 people, mainly Syrian refugees, are camping in the underpass area in front of the station. Conditions have grown increasingly squalid despite the efforts of volunteers distributing water, food, medicine and disinfectants.

On Wednesday, the people camped outside Budapest station had threatened to walk the 105 miles (170km) to the Austrian border if police did not let them board trains to their desired destinations in Austria and Germany.

Hungary, which for months had permitted most applicants to head west after short bureaucratic delays, now says it won’t let more groups deeper into the European Union and claims EU backing for the move.

There was no immediate explanation from police or other authorities of Thursday’s decisions, which came hours before the Hungarian prime minister, Viktor Orbán, was to meet EU leaders in Brussels to discuss the growing humanitarian crisis.

Hungary announced this week that it would deploy troops to its southern border with Serbia from 15 September. A €100m, four-metre-high razor wire fence has failed to stem the flow of people: 2,061 were apprehended at the border on Wednesday.

Meanwhile, Bulgarian authorities have detained 125 foreigners in the capital, Sofia, for illegally crossing into the country without submitting an asylum request, the interior ministry said on Thursday. Georgi Kostov, secretary general of the interior ministry, said they would be questioned and their applications might be granted.

 

[mzkitty]

1m
Hungarian police tell media to leave Bicske railway station, declaring it an 'operation zone' - @Reuters
End of alert

 

[mzkitty]

5m
4 suspected people smugglers arrested in Turkey in connection with deaths of toddler and 11 others trying to reach Greece - @DoganNewsAgency
End of alert


3m
British Labour party spokeswoman for internal affairs urges parliamentary debate on refugee crisis - @YvetteCooperMP


2m
Photo: International media taken away from train with migrants from Budapest on board - @jamesmatesitv

 

[Melodi]

I do not know if this is the second time this has happened in 24 hours or if the reports of this happening in Bulgaria were reported incorrectly - either way the message is clear and explains why people are now terrified of "camps." For those under 40, such numbers were put on the Jews with tattooing ink when they were sent to the death camps.. - Melodi


Czech police haul migrants off trains to Germany and 'write numbers on their arms in ink'

Numbers crossing the Czech Republic have jumped in recent days
Adam Withnall Author Biography

Wednesday 02 September 2015

Czech police have reportedly begun removing refugees from trains headed to Germany, detaining migrants and numbering them in pen written on their arms.

The Czech prime minister has called a meeting with his counterparts in Austria and Slovakia to discuss the growing influx of refugees in eastern and central Europe.

According to local media, in the early hours of Tuesday morning around 200 were arrested on trains arriving from Austria and Hungary in the southern Czech region of Moravia.

Pictures in Czech media showed police officers writing registration numbers on the wrists and arms of migrants with permanent marker pens, while the refugees themselves told reporters they were travelling from Budapest, had purchased valid train tickets and were allowed to board by police in Hungary.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/w...te-numbers-on-their-arms-in-ink-10482651.html

 

[mzkitty]

1m
David Cameron 'deeply moved' by pictures of Aylan Kurdi, says Britain to fulfil its 'moral responsibilities' - @BBCBreaking


3m
France and Germany agree binding migrant quotas needed - @AFP, @Elysee


19m
Photo: Port of Lesvos with 4,000 people trying to be registered, trying to leave - @KateOSully

 

[Melodi]

Go to the link for the many pictures this is the UK Daily Mail (one step away from the National Enquirer) so they tend to do stories like this one day followed by "raving hordes about to eat you" the next type stuff but the photos are good, the Daily Mail often has good ones - Melodi

Biblical: Thousands of migrants emerge from the hold of a ferry onto the streets of Greece's capital, Athens

EU draws up emergency plan to relocate 160,000 stranded refugees across the continent (but Britain will take ZERO)

Refugees in Italy, Greece and Hungary to be relocated across the EU
Leaked plan sees Germany taking 30,000, France 26,000 and Spain 16,000
However the UK secured an opt out when the original scheme was set up
If Britain was in the scheme it would be expected to take 17,000 refugees
Revelation will increase pressure on David Cameron to open the UK border

By Tom McTague, Deputy Political Editor for MailOnline

Published: 11:13 GMT, 3 September 2015 | Updated: 12:23 GMT, 3 September 2015


EU leaders have drawn up a plan to relocate 160,000 refugees around the Continent – but Britain will remain exempt from taking any.

Under the new scheme, migrants stranded in Italy, Greece and Hungary will be transferred to countries across the EU based on their population and economic wealth.

It will see Germany granting asylum to 35,000 refugees, France accepting 26,000 and Spain 16,000.

Even poverty-stricken Bulgaria and Romania will be expected to take thousands of families.

However, the UK – which refused to join the scheme when it was originally set up in May – will not have to take in any refugees despite being one of the largest and wealthiest countries in the EU.

If the UK were to take the same share as the rest of the EU it would be expected to grant asylum to around 17,000 refugees - or 11 per cent of the total number.

According to today's leaked EU document there are 54,000 asylum seekers in Hungary 39,600 in Italy, 66,400 in Greece.

The scale of the crisis has piled pressure on David Cameron to open Britain’s borders to trapped refugees.

The Prime Minister insists that the answer to the asylum crisis is not offering refuge to desperate migrants fleeing the Middle East and North Africa.

But the public outcry over the EU’s failure to act has grown after the death of two young Syrian brothers who died trying to reach Europe.

Diplomatic pressure on Mr Cameron is grown in recent days, with Germany and Austria accusing the British PM of behaving like it is 'out of the club in this big task of sharing the burden'.

Around 2,000 migrants from Syria have been forced to sleep near the Keleti railway station in Budapest

Italian minister for European affairs Sandro Gozi suggested Mr Cameron risks losing support for his plans to curb benefits for migrants.

The crisis escalated last night with border controls reintroduced after and Germany admitted it could no longer cope with the influx.

Berlin had sought to criticise others – including Britain – for not taking in enough refugees after it announced it would no longer deport those coming from Syria.

But the EU’s passport-free travel zone was on the brink of collapse after Germany was forced to ask Italy to tighten border controls.

As tensions between European leaders unable to agree on how to handle the crisis simmered, Slovakia’s foreign minister Miroslav Lajcak said the Schengen Agreement removing border checks between 26 European countries has fallen apart.

Biblical: Thousands of migrants emerge from the hold of a ferry onto the streets of Greece's capital, Athens
+11
Chilling echo: In scenes reminiscent of Nazi Germany, Czech police use marker pens to number mainly Syrian refugees, including dozens of children, before arresting them

Last night, as the numbers crossing into Germany reached nearly 150 per hour, it asked Italy to impose identification checks at Brennero, on the border with Austria, to ease the flow.

An unprecedented surge of migrants has been trying to get to the country after Berlin last week began accepting asylum claims from Syrian refugees regardless of where they entered the EU.

It has caused chaos across eastern Europe as authorities have struggled to cope with the vast numbers who, as undocumented migrants, are theoretically barred from travelling across the EU. Figures released yesterday showed a record 104,460 asylum seekers arrived in Germany last month.

German officials last night insisted that its request to tighten border controls was a ‘temporary measure’.

But Mr Lajcak said the Schengen Agreement had ‘de facto fallen apart’. ‘There are tens of thousands of people walking around here without anyone checking them,’ he said. ‘So, do we have Schengen, or don’t we?’

Stephan Mayer, a senior MP in German leader Angela Merkel’s party, said: ‘I do not think Schengen is over… But I certainly see the danger that if it is not possible in the long run to apply European asylum rules, that this directly erodes and endangers Schengen.’

David Cameron insists that the answer to the crisis is not offering refuge to desperate migrants fleeing north Africa


Tory MP David Burrowes (left) said Britain had taken a lead in providing a humanitarian and military response in north Africa but that had to be matched by a 'refuge response'. Nadhim Zahawi, MP for Stratford-on-Avon, said Britain was 'nothing without compassion'

In the Czech Republic, around 200 migrants trying to head to Germany from Hungary were hauled off trains in the southern region of Moravia. Police officers used permanent marker pens to number the refugees, who included dozens of children, before arresting them.

An estimated 3,000 people – mostly wanting to get to Germany – were camped at Keleti station in Budapest as officials said that under EU migration rules they were not allowed to travel. Hungary’s prime minister Viktor Orban will today meet EU chiefs to discuss the crisis.

In Austria, 24 Afghan refugees were rescued from an abandoned lorry. They had been locked in and left to suffocate.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...ees-continent-Britain-ZERO.html#ixzz3kgIGSE1y
Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook

 

[Lilbitsnana]

Conflict News ‏@Conflicts 5m5 minutes ago

BREAKING: France and Germany agree that binding refugee quotas are needed - @France24_en #refugeecrisis

 

[mzkitty]

22m
Turkish PM Davutoğlu says Turkey will keep its doors open to refugees - @Reuters
End of alert


31m
Hungary and Bulgaria have made enquiries to Israel about the design of its border barriers with Egypt - @Reuters

http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/09/03/us-europe-migrants-israel-fences-idUSKCN0R31GE20150903


5m
Photo: Some people have left train in Bicske which arrived from Budapest and are being put on a coach - @Imeldaflattery

 

[summerthyme]

Moved post to appropriate thread, now that I found it!

Summerthyme

 

[Oreally]

The flood of refugees from the problems in the ME and Africa and Afgan has no logical end. I have sympathy for these people but europe can't allow it's indigenous cultures to be swamped, especially by hoards of muslims.

everyone must know that once there they are never to be going home.

this whole crisis was engineered for exactly this result.

it won't be too long before the people in europe rise up and revolt themselves.

 

[Be Well]

The flood of refugees from the problems in the ME and Africa and Afgan has no logical end. I have sympathy for these people but europe can't allow it's indigenous cultures to be swamped, especially by hoards of muslims.

everyone must know that once there they are never to be going home.

this whole crisis was engineered for exactly this result.

it won't be too long before the people in europe rise up and revolt themselves.

I guess Melodi didn't like my thread.

 

[Melodi]

OReally and Bewell, I don't see a news article attached to your comments, I have already explained to Be Well this is a NEWS ONLY thread - although short comments are allowed before you post a story if you wish (or just post the story). This is a thread for BREAKING NEWS on the EU/EUROPEAN situation, comments can be made on Be Well's excellent thread or any of the other three comment threads already on the main board.

Now several people on the comments thread asked "why don't people flee to other Muslim countries?" good question and the BBC tries to answer with this article - short version - they won't take them hmmm stuff for the comment threads all right..

Migrant crisis: Why Syrians do not flee to Gulf states
By Amira Fathalla BBC Monitoring

Image copyright Getty Images
Image caption Syrian and Afghan refugees are demanding the right to travel to Germany from Keleti (East) railway station in Budapest

As the crisis brews over Syrian refugees trying to enter European countries, questions have been raised over why they are not heading to wealthy Gulf states closer to home.

Although those fleeing the Syrian crisis have for several years been crossing into Lebanon, Jordan and Turkey in huge numbers, entering other Arab states - especially in the Gulf - is far less straightforward.

Officially, Syrians can apply for a tourist visa or work permit in order to enter a Gulf state.

But the process is costly, and there is a widespread perception that many Gulf states have unwritten restrictions in place that make it hard for Syrians to be granted a visa in practice.
Image copyright Getty Images

Image caption Syrians have flooded into the UN-run Zaatari refugee camp, north-east of the Jordanian capital Amman

Most successful cases are Syrians already in Gulf states extending their stays, or those entering because they have family there.

For those with limited means, there is the added matter of the sheer physical distance between Syria and the Gulf.
Not welcome?

This comes as part of wider obstacles facing Syrians, who are required to obtain rarely granted visas to enter almost all Arab countries.

Without a visa, Syrians are not currently allowed to enter Arab countries except for Algeria, Mauritania, Sudan and Yemen.

The relative wealth and proximity to Syria of the states has led many - in both social and as well as traditional media - to question whether these states have more of a duty than Europe towards Syrians suffering from over four years of conflict and the emergence of jihadist groups in the country.

 

[mzkitty]

I guess Melodi didn't like my thread.

I don't think that's true, BW. See her reasoning in the first post.

-----------------


3m
Hungarian Prime Minister says refugees threaten 'Christian roots' of his country and they do not want large number of Muslims - @Reuters
End of alert

 

[Be Well]

I will post all EU Migration/immigration/refugee news on this thread now. Apologies for my misunderstandings of various kinds.

http://www.breitbart.com/national-s...essives-to-blame-for-huge-migrant-death-toll/

U.S. Immigration Experts: Europe’s Progressives to Blame for Huge Migrant Death Toll

Neil Munro 3 Sep 2015

Europe’s post-national progressive governing elite is competing to display its supposed horror over the rapidly rising number of migrants’ corpses now being washed up on Mediterranean beaches.

But those self-regarding progressives deserve much of the blame for the multi-thousand toll of migrants suffering egregious conditions trying to enter Europe, say U.S. immigration experts.

This, they argue, is because the progressives want to ignore the lessons of other migration crises — including the now-ended 2013 Pacific rush into Australia — and want to use the picture of dead migrants to break open their continent’s backdoor to huge migrations from the developing world. So far, they have opened the door wide enough to attract millions of people eager to make the risky migration around the safe-but-closed legal entrance to Europe’s placid and very civil society.

“The migrants are mainly responsible for making these decisions, and the smugglers are criminals, but the [European] governments share the responsibility,” for casualties along the risky route, said Mark Krikorian, director of the D.C.-based Center for Immigration Studies. “By not enforcing [immigration] rules, they are thereby communicating to potential migrants that [the dangerous trip] is worth the risk.” Many of the migrants are getting through the back door into Europe, so their trail of dead is a rational price for entry into Europe, Krikorian said.

“Unless [European governments] are going to allow hundreds of millions of people to come over legally into Europe, there’s no [smaller] number they could chose that would ensure more people won’t come” via the risky sea passage, said Roy Beck, the founder of NumbersUSA.

“There’s no way to create [narrow] legal channels that stop the dying,” he said, adding the only feasible fix is to create “well-funded, well-run international refugees camps, as close to the home countries are you can, so it is easy for the migrants to to go home.” His group advocates to reduce the annual legal inflow of roughly 1.5 million people into the United States. In comparison, 4 million Americans are born each year.

The risky migration is also a safer option for many Syrian migrants, who would otherwise have to fight the Islamic State’s expanding jihadi army. It is also means that Europe’s progressive governments can discard the uncomfortable strategic option of recruiting eligible migrants into a Syrian army that can defeat ISIS.

The progressive hand-wringing about the migration has reached a new peak following the garish display of a picture showing a small drowned child, face-down on a Mediterranean beach.

The dead child, along with his two dead siblings and mother, was trying to reach Greece but sank into the sea. Two accompanying smugglers grabbed the only two lifejackets and floated back to shore.

Some progressives are using this photo as an argument to further open the door to more migrants. The New York Times and the Washington Post, for example, posted similar images on their websites Sept. 3. The dead child was used to fill the entire Sept. 2 frontpage of London’s leading progressive daily, The Independent.

“The Independent has taken the decision to publish these images because, among the often glib words about the ‘ongoing migrant crisis,’ it is all too easy to forget the reality of the desperate situation facing many refugees,” the editors intoned. “The pictures, and the tragedy they convey, are hard to ignore, and now senior politicians are calling on [Prime Minister David] Cameron to do more to tackle the crisis,” they claimed.

Most progressive European leaders want more migration and want the resulting chaotic diversity that would be managed by big governments.

Italy’s Prime Minister, Matteo Renzi, repealed the nation’s law against illegal migration, and declared in June that strong borders will wreck progressives’ political plans. “We want to fight for a set of values, for civility and peace… If we ignore the [migrants] now, while the Mediterranean seethes, and children drown, it is Europe itself that we lose.”

France’s socialist government has also announced intentions to allow migrants to stay in the country, and Germany’s government has announced it will accept all the migrants from Syrian who can survive the trek through Turkey and Greece, Macedonia, Serbia and Hungary. Roughly 800,00 migrants are expected this year. That’s equivalent to 3 million migrants crossing over the Texas border in one year.

Europe’s governments are cautious compared to United Nations officials. “As mobility is increasing with globalization, instead of resisting it, we should organize it,” claimed François Crépeau, the special rapporteur on the human rights of migrants. “That means opening legal channels [worldwide] for people to be able to come and look for work” in developed countries, he insisted.

Such statements are causing a rising howl of protest from ordinary Europeans, and are prompting other countries to rebuild the border controls that were abolished after the prior effort by German socialists to set policy for Europe from 1939 to 1945.

The U.K.’s government wants to exclude nearly all non-European migrants. Holland’s government has announced plans to expel economic migrants. Slovakia won’t take any Muslims. Hungary is stopping trains and is building a razor-wire wall to block the migrants.

The Independent’s editors are disgusted by this popular uprising against elite preferences. “While images of desperate refugees emerge almost every day, the attitude of Europe’s policymakers and much of the public have continued to harden,” they complained.

But by late Sept. 2, only 12,500 people had signed the petition by the Independent calling on the nation’s prime minister to accept the U.K.’s “share” of Muslim migrants. The newspaper did not say what the U.K.’s share would be of the perhaps 500 million people who might trying to reach Europe, and the minuscule number of people who signed the Independent’s petition shows the progressives’ political isolation.

In the United States, American media progressives are also displaying their virtue by bewailing the reluctance of ordinary Europeans — and also Americans — to extinguish their own cultures under a tsunami of foreign migrants.

But those progressives in Europe and the United States are also choosing to ignore the lesson from Australia, where a naval shield has entirely stopped the huge wave of migrants who sailed south from Vietnam, Afghanistan, the Philippines and other countries in 2013 and 2014.

“Today we celebrate that we have not had a successful people smuggling venture in a year, and that over the course of the last 18 months or so we have turned back 20 boats and stopped 633 people from arriving in our country,” announced the nation’s migration minister, Peter Dutton.

He is part of a conservative government that was elected to power in 2013 after the prior progressive government deployed a force of billable-hour immigration lawyers to process the ever-increasing flood of Asian migrants.

Unsurprisingly, the lawyers only attracted more migrants, and the stream became a flood and then a tidal wave.

More than 1,200 migrants drowned policy changed to prohibit further migration. That’s roughly 1 dead man, woman or child for every 10 people who have signed the Independent’s petition so far.

In contrast, the Italian navy is being used to escort or transport law-breaking migrants from Africa into Italian ports, cities, town and villages — and so the flood of migrants grows each month.

“The Australians are showing tough love,” said Krikorian. “People thought [Australia’s naval barrier] might be too strict, but in the longer term, which is, by the way, a year, it turns out to be the more compassionate decision.”

 

[Publius]

Some may try to push this and the deaths for more open borders and allow a free flow of people from other countries.
The problem lies with a hidden political agenda and from what I learned it started with the Saudi and Qatar government wanting to run a number of oil and gas pipe lines threw Syria. Saudis and Qatar does not want to pay and fees or royalties to anyone they just want it free and clear. Obama is aiding them, and most of the upheaval seen in the middle east with and after the uprising in Egypt is obamas fault and he played a direct hand in all of it and hillary helped him.

 

[Melodi]

Thank you BeWell and I am sorry over the confusion caused; Publius thank you for you comments but please attach a newstory or published op-ed piece next time on this thread; BeWell has a thread for all immigration and includes comments; this one is mostly for news stories on the situation in Europe..

From Ireland this evening:
Irish 'pledge a bed' for refugees campaign is overwhelmed with offers
Sasha Brady

Published
03/09/2015 | 18:32

Migrants walk to board a train to Munich at the railway station in Vienna, Austria, September 1, 2015. REUTERS/Leonhard Foeger

Frustrated by the government's response to the deepening migration crisis, Irish advocacy group, Uplift, has set up a 'Pledge a Bed' campaign for people to share their homes with refugees.

Over 1,030 Irish people signed up to the 'Pledge a Bed' campaign within three hours of its inception and that number is expected to rise.

The campaign allows Irish people to register an offer of accommodation for refugees.

"At the moment we can only take pledges and not definite commitments. However, the overwhelming response demonstrates that Irish citizens are stepping up their efforts and are willing to help more refugees than what the government is offering to take in," Director of Uplift Siobhan O'Donoghue told Independent.ie.

"This is a powerful message to Enda Kenny's dismal response to the crisis."


The Uplift campaign follows similar schemes across Europe offering their support to refugees.

A German group called Refugees Welcome, which has been described as an "Airbnb for refugees," has helped people fleeing from war-torn countries. More than 780 Germans have signed up to the website and 26 people have been placed in private homes so far.

In the UK, professor Michael Stewart set up a Facebook group for people to share their homes with refugees.

Having only created the group late on Wednesday, the 56-year-old Londoner said he was heartened to find hundreds of users joined within 24 hours and offered spare rooms, sofas or donations towards hosting if they did not have the space.

"The power of social media has united people from all across Britain and Europe and brought us together to do something extraordinary and offer support and solidarity to those in need." Stewart told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

The influx of refugees has strained the EU's asylum system to breaking point, sowing division among its 28 nations, which have taken sharply opposing positions on whether to offer welcome.

http://www.independent.ie/irish-new...aign-is-overwhelmed-with-offers-31500342.html

 

[Melodi]

Ukip candidate sparks outrage by blaming Aylan Kurdi's 'greedy' parents for his death
David Kearns

Published
03/09/2015 | 18:00

A tweet by former Ukip candidate Peter Bucklitsch Credit: Twitter

A former Ukip candidate has sparked outrage after he blamed the parents of dead Syrian tot Aylan Al-Kurdi for being "greedy for the good life in Europe".

Photos of three-year-old washed up on a Turkish beach has stunned the world and have led many to question Europe’s response to the refugee crisis.

Peter Bucklitsch, who finished fourth in the Wimbledon constituency at in the UK’s general election in May, shocked Twitter users by claiming that the three-year-old Aylan Kurdi was "well clothed & well fed".



He suggested the boy's parents should not have risked his life by trying to make the 13-mile journey across the Mediterranean from Turkey to the Greek island of

He also made the claim that Turkey "is not a place where the family was in danger" and said: "Leaving that safe place put the family in peril".

Responding to criticism, he added the child’s death was the “cost” for trying to jump the immigration queue.

His posts, since deleted, triggered a furious backlash on Twitter, with many users describing him as "evil," "heartless" and "unbelievably cruel".

Online Editors

 

[Melodi]

Cameron bows to pressure to allow more Syrian refugees into Britain

Prime minister vows UK will take thousands of people currently in UN refugee camps on the Syrian border

Patrick Wintour and Nicholas Watt

Thursday 3 September 2015 20.24 BST
Last modified on Thursday 3 September 2015 21.04 BST


David Cameron has bowed to growing international and domestic demands that Britain take in more refugees fleeing the Syrian civil war by indicating that the UK would accept thousands more refugees.

Final details of the numbers, funding and planned location of the refugees, were being urgently sorted out in Whitehall, with local councils insisting the programme had to be fully funded by central government.

People selected to come to the UK are likely to be drawn from the UNHCR camps on the border of Syria and not from Calais or other locations near the country. But the final number of refugees allowed in to the UK will amount to fewer than tens of thousands, well short of the numbers likely to be taken by Germany.

The prime minister appeared to remain convinced that accepting a large number of Syrian refugees who were already in Europe would worsen the crisis and create more chaos; it would incentivise criminal gangs to persuade more people to undertake the risky journey across the Mediterranean and eastern Europe from the Middle East.

Cameron believes that, since there are reportedly two million Syrian refugees in the Middle East, the ultimate answer does not lie in taking refugees but in finding a political solution within Syria.

Downing Street officials acknowledged that Cameron had been moved to act by the scale of the gathering crisis as well as the change in the public mood brought to a head by the publication of heartbreaking pictures showing a Syrian boy drowned and washed up on a beach in Turkey.

Ministers insist the levels of British financial aid to fund the UNHCR-run camps has been as generous as any other country. But with a steady build-up of politicians, church leaders, council leaders and community groups urging the government to show greater humanity, Cameron signalled a change of tone on Thursday, saying: “Britain is a moral nation and we will fulfil our moral responsibilities.”

Before details of the refugee plan emerged, Cameron, speaking at a Hitachi train plant in Newton Aycliffe, County Durham, said: “Anyone who saw those pictures overnight could not help but be moved and, as a father, I felt deeply moved by the sight of that young boy on a beach in Turkey.”

Justin Welby, the archbishop of Canterbury, branded the refugee emergency a “wicked crisis” and said his heart was “broken” by the harrowing images of men, women and children fleeing persecution. He added: “We cannot turn our backs on this crisis. We must respond with compassion, but we must also not be naive in claiming to have the answers to end it.

Cameron faced pressure from some of his own backbenchers, including many Christians, to offer to do more. The mayor of London, Boris Johnson, also called for him to change tack. “We should take people fleeing persecution and those plainly in fear for their lives. London will, of course, face up to its moral responsibilities,” he said.

France and Germany called on the EU on Thursday to force member countries to take obligatory quotas of refugees and asylum seekers.

Refugees and police in a standoff at Bicske, Hungary, where officials attempted to take them to a camp. Photograph: Herbert P Oczeret/EPA

The German chancellor, Angela Merkel, said, during a visit to Switzerland, that the French-German position represented a “sharing of duty … the principle of solidarity”. Shortly afterwards, François Hollande, the French president, said there should be a permanent and obligatory mechanism for the accepting of refugees. He carefully avoided using the word “quota”.

Tensions between EU member states have risen in recent days with 3,000 people camping outside the Keleti railway station in Budapest, hoping to be allowed to travel to Germany following its declaration that Syrians who reached the country would be allowed to stay.

On the edge of the EU’s borders, Abdullah Kurdi, the father of the Syrian boy who was photographed lying lifeless on a Turkish beach after his family attempted to reach the Greek island of Kos, said he was preparing to take the bodies of his two sons and wife to be buried in his home town of Kobani.

Kurdi said he no longer had any desire to continue on his journey to Europe. Speaking outside the mortuary where the bodies of his two sons were being held, he said: “I just want to see my children for the last time and stay forever with them.”

The imminent new intake of refugees will be taken from the two million Syrians sheltering in border refugee camps probably under an existing Home Office vulnerable person relocation scheme set up last year and administered in conjunction with the UNHCR that resettles Syrians.

Only 200 have been taken by Britain so far under this scheme, although the government has given asylum or other forms of humanitarian protection to nearly 5,000 Syrians who have applied for asylum having reached Britain since the crisis started in early 2011.

Cameron said: “There isn’t a solution to this problem that is simply about taking people. We need a comprehensive solution; a new government in Libya. We need to deal with the problems in Syria. I would say the people responsible for these terrible scenes we see, the people most responsible, are president Assad in Syria and the butchers of Isil [Islamic State] and the criminal gangs that are running this terrible trade in people. And we have to be as tough on them at the same time.”

Downing Street is nervous of being seen to open UK borders or to be dragged into an EU-led scheme. It fears that a potentially “fickle” outburst of compassion, in part driven by news organisations, could obscure continued deep concerns about immigration among the British public.

Yvette Cooper, the shadow home secretary, who has led the calls for greater government compassion, welcomed signs of a government change of heart, but said as many as 10,000 refugees should be accepted.

Harriet Harman, the interim Labour leader, called on Cameron to convene an emergency meeting of the Cobra cabinet committee to draw together the government response.

Cameron was accused by Scotland’s first minister, Nicola Sturgeon, of adopting a “walk on by on the other side” approach after he said on Wednesday that the UK would not take any extra refugees. Alex Salmond the SNP foreign affairs spokesman, said: “Cameron is shaming not just the UK, he is shaming humanity with his total abject refusal to accept any joint collective responsibility.”
http://www.theguardian.com/world/20...re-to-allow-more-syrian-refugees-into-britain

 

[Melodi]

Alan Kelly indicates Ireland may take thousands of refugees
52
168
Thursday 03 September 2015 23.10

Minister for the Environment Alan Kelly has said he thinks Ireland will be taking a volume of refugees "in the thousands" in the coming years.

Mr Kelly said the matter will be discussed at Government and the country will take its fair share of refugees.

He said: "Irish people want us as a country to step up to the mark and we will... This Government is going to show leadership in order to do that. "

The minister added that he believes Ireland should take a leadership role with regard to the escalating refugee crisis in Europe.

Mr Kelly said Ireland is well placed to do so as "we have always punched above our weight", and because Irish people have experienced a huge sense of sadness, grief and loss.

Ireland has an "opt out" option from a number of Justice and Home Affairs rules under EU law, but has agreed to "opt in" voluntarily on the relocation of migrants who have arrived in Italy and Greece.

A proposal by the European Commission in May called for a binding quota system for the relocation of refugees, but it was rejected by EU leaders in June.

Instead a voluntary quota system was put in place to relocate 40,000 people.

So far, the uptake by member states has fallen short at 32,000 people.

Following a meeting of justice ministers in July Ireland agreed to voluntarily accept 600 people.

The Commission will relaunch a mandatory system next week and justice ministers will seek to agreement on it on 14 September.


Minister for Defence, Agriculture & the Marine Simon Coveney has said that Ireland will take in "many more than 600" refugees.

Speaking on RTɒs Primetime programme Minister Coveney said he had spoken to a lot of ministers today and that they all accepted that Ireland needed to do more in terms of resettling refugees.

"The basis for the 600 figure until now was that Ireland is 1% of the population of Europe, we want to do more than our population suggests we should be doing because of our history and quite frankly because Irish people would expect us to do it, so we will go way beyond that figure in my view." the minister said.

http://www.rte.ie/news/2015/0903/725315-migrants/

 

[Melodi]

EU plan for refugees expected next week

Proposal to relocate 120,000 migrants across EU to be unveiled on Wednesday

Migrants protest outside the Keleti railway station in Budapest, Hungary. Photograph: Reuters

Suzanne Lynch

Thu, Sep 3, 2015, 23:05

First published:
Thu, Sep 3, 2015, 21:04

The European Commission is expected to unveil a new proposal next week to relocate an extra 120,000 refugees across the European Union, amid mounting calls for a united EU response to the migrant crisis unfolding across Europe.

The plan, to be revealed by European Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker on Wednesday in Strasbourg, will propose the redistribution of 120,000 people arriving in Italy, Greece and Hungary across the bloc. This is in addition to the 32,000 migrants that the EU agreed to accept in June.

But there were fears that the EU would struggle to secure the support of all member states for the proposal, with Britain, Spain and a clutch of east European countries still opposing the redistribution of refugees. The EU is facing the biggest mass movement of people since the second World War.

No opt-out for Ireland
Ireland, which has an automatic opt-out from most EU justice and home affairs legislation, will be obliged to opt in to any new relocation proposal.

The British government was expected to announce plans on Thursday night to relocate thousands of refugees in UN refugee camps on the Syrian border to Britain. This follows strong criticism of British prime minister David Cameron’s handling of the crisis by the Council of Europe, the 47-member human rights body yesterday. It is not clear whether Britain will opt in to any EU-wide plan.

The refugee crisis is expected to dominate Friday’s meeting of EU foreign ministers in Luxembourg which will be attended by Minister for Foreign Affairs Charlie Flanagan.

As thousands of undocumented people continued to enter the EU by sea and land yesterday, the three-year-old boy found dead on a Turkish beach on Wednesday was named as Aylan Kurdi. He and his five-year-old brother and mother were among a group of up to 13 people who drowned off Turkey, though his father survived.

The family, from the Kurdish town of Kobani, were hoping to join relatives in Canada. Turkish news agencies reported that four people-smugglers had been arrested.

Chaos in Hungary Meanwhile, chaotic scenes continued in Hungary on Thursday. Following a two-day stand-off between migrants and Hungarian authorities, those seeking asylum were permitted to enter Budapest’s main international station and board trains. However, a train heading to the Austrian border stopped in the town of Bicske, 35km from Budapest, where migrants were ordered to go to a nearby reception area, sparking protests.

Speaking in Brussels, where he held emergency meetings with top EU officials, Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orban struck a defiant tone, describing the migrant crisis as a “German problem”. Mr Orban sparked anger by referring to the religion of those seeking asylum in an article in German daily Frankfurter Allgemeine. “Those arriving have been raised in another religion, and represent a radically different culture,” he wrote. “This is an important question, because Europe and European identity is rooted in Christianity.”

Speaking in Paris on Thursday, Taoiseach Enda Kenny said the picture of three-year-old Aylan Kurdi “may well shock political processes into taking action”.
http://www.irishtimes.com/news/world/europe/eu-plan-for-refugees-expected-next-week-1.2339528

 

[Melodi]

Migrants refuse to leave train near Hungary camp

3 hours ago
From the section Europe

Scuffles have broken out west of the Hungarian capital, Budapest, after police tried to force migrants off a train at a refugee camp.

Amid chaotic scenes, police ordered journalists from the scene at Bicske, declaring it an "operation zone".

The train had left Budapest hours after police let migrants into the railway station following a two-day stand-off.

Meanwhile, there have been sharp disagreements among European leaders over how to deal with the crisis.

As it happened: Thursday's developments

In Brussels, Hungary's Prime Minister Viktor Orban described the situation as a "German problem" as Germany was where those arriving in the EU "would like to go".

But European Council President Donald Tusk said at least 100,000 refugees should be distributed across EU states.

In other developments on Thursday:

German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Francois Hollande said they would present joint proposals for the redistribution of refugees within the EU

Czech police are to stop writing numbers on migrants' hands after criticism from human rights groups

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan accused European nations of turning the Mediterranean into a "cemetery for refugees"

Bayern Munich football club said it would set up a training camp for refugees coming into Germany

The human cost of the crisis was put into sharp focus on Wednesday when five children were among 12 migrants who drowned in Turkish waters while trying to reach Greece.

Images of the washed-up body of three-year-old Alan Kurdi, who died alongside his mother and five-year-old brother, circulated widely on social media.

Earlier on Thursday, migrants who had been camped outside Budapest's Keleti railway station surged on to the platforms as soon as police withdrew.


The BBC's Gavin Hewitt on board the train at Bicske

Nothing illustrates how difficult this crisis is to resolve than what has happened to these several hundred refugees who are currently on this train at Bicske.

There were some police on board. We got as far as Bicske and when the train pulled in, there were loads of police waiting for them on the platform. The plan seemed to be to take them to a centre where they would be properly identified. Some people left the first carriage, but almost immediately there was resistance. A lot of people were banging on the windows - some were shouting "Germany! Germany!" The police put on riot gear.

Some refugees who had been taken off the train began pushing and jostling and there was a little bit of fighting with riot police. And then they forced their way back on the train, which is where we are at the moment with police on the platform and several hundred refugees on the train.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-34142512

 

[Melodi]

OK - I thought I was done for the night but various questions have come up on the comments threads again, mostly about what is different about now and is this really a refugee or an economic migration - here are a few stories or op eds I did not post earlier. Op-eds are UK speak for editorial so they are one person's opinion as in this first piece. Melodi

Patrick Cockburn

Thursday 3 September 2015
Syria's Kurds have little choice but to flee amid the desolution, ruins and danger they face

Their future is full of menaces in the shape of a hostile Turkey to the north and Isis to the south


The Kurdish enclave of Kobani in north-east Syria, once the home of Aylan al-Kurdi and his family, is largely in ruins after a four-and-a-half month siege by Isis fighters that ended in January. It was one of the greatest victories in Kurdish history, but a Pyrrhic one that saw 300,000 Syrian Kurds flee into Turkey from Kobani, a city just south of the Turkish border, and from the 250 villages surrounding it.

Isis may have been driven back, but the Kobani enclave remains a desolate, ruined and very dangerous place. Some 70 per cent of the city was destroyed in the fighting, by Isis suicide bombs and mortars, Kurdish counter-fire, and US air strikes using 500lb and 2,000lb bombs to smash Isis positions. At one point, Isis set fire to buildings in order to create a smokescreen to protect them from US aircraft.

In most of Kobani city there is no water or electricity supply and retreating Isis forces booby-trapped many of the shattered buildings, so these cannot be easily cleared. The fighting was more intense and went on longer than any recent battle in Iraq or Syria, with Isis – which calls itself Islamic State – losing an estimated 2,000 fighters and the Kurdish YPG militia some 560.

After January there was a trickle of Kurdish refugees returning from Turkey to Kobani because life among the ruins was better than in the squalid refugee camps. But the Syrian Kurdish authorities turned out to be tragically over-confident that Isis was incapable of a counter-attack. On 25 June some 100 Isis fighters disguised in YPG uniforms entered Kobani and a village 20km to the south of the city and began a massacre that left between 223 and 233 men, women and children butchered, along with 35 YPG militiamen. Syrian Kurdish refugees in Turkey will have got the message that it is not safe to go home even when their forces are advancing with the help of US air strikes and Isis is retreating.

Kobani is one of three Kurdish enclaves just south of the Turkish border that have created their own quasi-state since the Syrian army withdrew in the summer of 2012. The 2.2 million Syrian Kurds, long discriminated against by the Damascus government, became a surprisingly important player in the Syrian civil war. Their enclaves, which they call cantons, are in strategically valuable places, controlling crossing points on the 550-mile border with Turkey. Half this frontier is now held by the YPG, denying Isis important crossing points between Turkey and Syria.

The Syrian Kurds have a political significance out of proportion to their numbers in the region’s civil wars. They have achieved a real measure of practical independence in the de facto Kurdish state called Rojava under the control of the Democratic Union Party (PYD) and its well-disciplined YPG militia. Since last October, the YPG has been the only effective ground force in Syria co-operating with US airpower against Isis. But the enhanced influence of the Syrian Kurds has made them a target for their many enemies. Turkey has been dismayed at finding what amounts to a Kurdish statelet controlling 250 miles of its southern frontier. Worse, the PYD and the YPG are the Syrian branch of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), a powerful guerrilla organisation that has been fighting the Turkish army since 1984.

This summer, Rojava, a fertile wedge of territory full of wheat fields and dotted with oil industry “nodding donkeys”, looked idyllic and peaceful compared with the rest of Syria. But for Syrian Kurds the future is full of menaces in the shape of a hostile Turkey to the north and Isis to the south. Moreover, any potential winner of the civil war in Syria may swiftly move to extinguish the Kurdish independent entity. In the face of these dangers, it is no wonder that Syrian Kurds will take any risk to escape to Europe or anywhere else where they might find safety.

http://www.independent.co.uk/voices...tion-ruins-and-danger-they-face-10485357.html

 

[Melodi]

Migration crisis: Germany presses Europe into sharing refugees

France agrees to proposed new quotas system and Brussels unveils plans to camp. Photograph: Matt Cardy/Getty Images

Ian Traynor in Brussels, Kim Willsher in Paris and Sabrina Siddiqui in Washington

Thursday 3 September 2015 18.48 BST
Last modified on Thursday 3 September 2015 21.03 BST

The German chancellor, Angela Merkel, looks set for victory in her campaign to press Europe into a new system of sharing refugees after France caved in to a proposed new quotas system and Brussels unveiled plans to quadruple the number of people spread across most of the EU.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/20...-germany-presses-europe-into-sharing-refugees

In a major policy speech on Europe’s worst migration emergency, Jean-Claude Juncker, the president of the European commission, is to table proposals next Wednesday for the mandatory sharing of 160,000 refugees between 26 of the EU’s 28 countries.

Britain, Ireland and Denmark are exempted from having to take part, but Dublin has already agreed to participate and David Cameron is under increasing pressure for Britain to pull its weight as the migration crisis escalates with scenes of chaos and misery on Europe’s borders.

Berlin and Paris have sought to maintain a common position for weeks, but the French equivocated on the key issue of binding quotas. On Thursday, the president, François Hollande, aligned himself with Merkel’s drive for compulsory EU sharing of refugees.

Merkel announced from Switzerland that both sides had agreed a common platform and Hollande said there should be a “permanent and obligatory mechanism” for receiving refugees in the EU.

“The president and the chancellor have today decided to forward joint proposals on the organisation of the reception of refugees and a fair sharing in Europe,” said the Élysée Palace.

Germany, along with the European commission, has been pushing hard for a new mandatory system since May when Juncker tabled much more modest proposals for the compulsory sharing of 40,000 bona fide asylum-seekers over two years. A summit of EU leaders in June rejected the quotas, saying they could only be voluntary and eventually agreeing to share only 32,000.

The east European countries and Spain were the main opponents. Four east European prime ministers are to meet on Friday to consider their positions. Mariano Rajoy, the Spanish prime minister, reiterated his opposition to quotas in Berlin this week.

But the speed of developments on the ground is dictating political responses. Donald Tusk, who chairs EU summits as president of the European council, said the EU should agree to share at least 100,000 refugees. In June, he opposed the quotas system. The proposed figures - 100,000 to 160,000 - refer merely to a mandatory quotas system, beyond the much higher numbers of asylum claims that the countries will have to process in any case. Germany alone expects 800,000 this year.

There is certain to be a fight over the new policy when EU interior ministers hold an extraordinary session on the migration crisis on 14 September.

In Brussels on Thursday, Hungary’s hardline anti-immigrant prime minister, Viktor Orban, said quotas would only encourage more people to head for Europe from the Middle East and Africa. “Quotas is an invitation for those who want to come,” he said. “The moral human thing is to make clear, please don’t come.”

But the east Europeans are under intense pressure to fall in with the German line and already Poland and Lithuania are making concessions.

There were pitiful scenes in Hungary where migrants thronged Budapest’s main railway station and packed into a train they believed was going to Austria en route to Germany, which has opened its doors unconditionally to refugees from Syria.

The train was halted 30km out of Budapest and met by a phalanx of riot police who sought to empty the carriages and march the people to a camp.

The Hungarian leader, widely criticised for his anti-immigrant policies and rhetoric, went on the offensive in Brussels. He said Europe was in the grip of madness over immigration and refugees and argued that he was defending European Christianity against a Muslim influx.

“Everything which is now taking place before our eyes threatens to have explosive consequences for the whole of Europe,” Orban wrote in Germany’s Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. “Europe’s response is madness. We must acknowledge that the European Union’s misguided immigration policy is responsible for this situation. Irresponsibility is the mark of every European politician who holds out the promise of a better life to immigrants and encourages them to leave everything behind and risk their lives in setting out for Europe.”

He painted the refugee emergency as a crisis between Christianity and Islam, with Hungary on the frontline, erecting razor wire fences to keep people out and defend European civilisation against incomers.
Germany and France demand binding refugee quotas for EU members
Read more

“Those arriving have been raised in another religion and represent a radically different culture. Most of them are not Christians, but Muslims,” he said. “This is an important question, because Europe and European identity is rooted in Christianity. Is it not worrying in itself that European Christianity is now barely able to keep Europe Christian? There is no alternative and we have no option but to defend our borders ... If Europe does not return to the path of common sense, it will find itself laid low in a battle for its fate.”

In Brussels, he invoked Hungary’s partial subjugation by the Ottoman empire in the 17th century as the reason why Hungarians did not want to live alongside Muslims.

In Washington, White House press secretary, Josh Earnest said that the European Union “certainly has the capacity” to deal with the refugee crisis and indicated that the US would support its allies with technical expertise – such as from the nation’s Coast Guard – and continue to offer financial assistance to meet humanitarian needs.

 

[Melodi]

OK gang this story is changing by the hour but I am done for the night here (it is midnight) unless something really breaking happens in the next little while here - this is the Red Cross story I mentioned on the comments thread - Melodi


British Red Cross launches major fundraising appeal after thousands contact charity to help combat refugee crisis

The appeal was launched after the heart-breaking image of drowned Syrian child Aylan Kurdi prompted thousands to contact the charity
Jamie Merril

Thursday 03 September 2015


The British Red Cross has launched a major fundraising appeal, after the heart-breaking image of a drowned Syrian child prompted thousands of people to contact the charity to help combat the refugee crisis.

The appeal will support the Red Cross’s work with refugees and asylum seekers, both in the UK and overseas in countries along the routes refugees are fleeing towards Europe.

It will aim to urgently help “desperate families who have no choice but to risk their lives to flee war and persecution” by providing food, water and medical care.

Money raised from the appeal will be spent by the British Red Cross but also provide equipment to Italian Red Cross doctors, nurses and ambulance staff who are on 24-hour standby to provide medical assistance to refugees arriving in the main ports of southern Italy.

Alex Fraser, head of refugee services for the British Red Cross, said:“As part of a global movement which works with refugees and asylum seekers around the world, the British Red Cross believes the best way to reduce the number of people driven to make the dangerous journey across the Mediterranean Sea (which for many, will continue across Europe) is to offer more safe and legal routes to protection.”

“It is time that Europe as a whole accepts this refugee crisis for what it is: a humanitarian disaster on a scale unseen since the Second World War. Responsibility to provide humanitarian support and a place of safety for people fleeing from conflict and persecution must be shared across Europe and we would like to see the UK lead by example by doing its part.”
Read more: Germans stage pro-migrant 'refugees welcome' rally

The British Red Cross appeal came as aid charities across Britain said they were inundated with offers of help from the public. Grass-roots groups were also springing up across the country. They included a community group in Folkestone which has raised more than £3,000 to buy blankets for refugees and migrants in Calais and pensioners in Dorset who have offered their spare rooms to refugees.

Mark Goldring, Oxfam GB's chief executive said: “The UK public has been shocked by the suffering of people who have been forced to flee from terrible danger. While the UK government has been generous in providing needed aid to those affected, this must be a wake-up to call welcome the country’s fair share of people who desperately need our help.”
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/u...y-to-help-combat-refugee-crisis-10485345.html

 

[Laurane]

Just want to ask if anyone has read that the bodies of the little boys and their mother are being repatriated to Syria......who is left there to bury them, and why didn't the whole family flee if their lives were in danger?

 

[bev]

This is crazy. I wanted to quote part of an article here and add comments, but now I have to go find the "comments thread" and, I guess, repost the whole article there? Or somehow figure out how to add a link there for the specific article here.

Nah, forget it.

 

[Be Well]

This is crazy. I wanted to quote part of an article here and add comments, but now I have to go find the "comments thread" and, I guess, repost the whole article there? Or somehow figure out how to add a link there for the specific article here.

Nah, forget it.

Here you go if you want it.

http://www.timebomb2000.com/vb/show...ion-Legal-and-Illegal-USA-and-EU-Thread/page4

 

[bev]

Never mind. But thanks anyway.

 

[Melodi]

Bev, I'm sorry we've had news only threads on other topics, if you want to quote a large part of an article and make a comment on the article; I don't really mind - I just want to keep this thread mostly for breaking news, so anyone who wants to see the latest news stories (mostly from over here but please post from elsewhere and opinion pieces are fine too) and MzKitty's tweets, knows where to come look; without going through two pages of comments first. This is such an emotional issue; that people have a lot to say, and I'm just trying to keep the actual media flowing in an easy at a glance manor.

OK not much change this morning - but I'll post a few examples, I'm trying to avoid the articles that are just "rah rah refugee - please send money too" unless like this one it is by an important Irish ArchBishop whose opinions still matter to a lot of people here:

'It's the biggest crisis since war and it's not going away': archbishop
Greg Harkin

Published
04/09/2015 | 02:30


Archbishop Diarmaid Martin has warned that the world now faces "the biggest refugee crisis since World War Two and it's not going to go away".


He criticised Government promises to do more, saying: "I'm always worried about people who talk in the future tense.

"Europe has not been responding adequately. It has been leaving it to the Italians and leaving it to the Greeks. We have to get a quota system working and I believe Ireland should take the numbers it is allocated, but we should be doing more not just in quantity but in quality too.

"We should take more than just the quota and ensuring what we do for them is worthy of them."

He said the Government should act now and not wait for any quota to be agreed.

"We should be doing that (taking refugees) today," he said. "I can see that there are parishes who will be willing to take in refugees within the legal framework set by the Government."

Bishop John McAreavey told the Irish Independent that he believed Ireland is ready to do its bit.

"It is one thing to send money to people overseas and Ireland has a fantastic record on that, but this is an entirely different thing we are being asked to do.

"I believe, however, that perhaps we are ready for a 'Road to Damascus' conversion, for all of our communities in Ireland to do their bit and share the burden equally."

Meanwhile, former Irish Attorney General Peter Sutherland, the UN's special representative on migration, defended his comments that the crisis was an "eminently manageable" situation.

He said that just five countries in Europe were currently sharing the burden of refugees.

"What we have now is an unbalanced assymetric European Union where people are responding in different ways and not following the European Commission proposal which should be a quota system fairly sharing the migrants between different countries."

He said Europe faced a "dire humanitarian crisis" and warned: "History will look back on this moment as a moment of failure by Europe as things stand; to stand up for its values or to apply them, that's the bottom line."

Irish Independent
http://www.independent.ie/irish-new...d-its-not-going-away-archbishop-31501419.html

 

[Melodi]

Figures a bit lower than last night...the Irish "Prime Minister" weighs in...

Refugee crisis: Taoiseach says Ireland could take in more than 1,800 people
“There’s got to be a clear plan and a clear strategy to help people who are so distressed by these events.”

Image: PA Wire/PA Images

Updated at 10.15am

IRELAND WILL TAKE more than the current 600 refugees we have signed up for, with both the Taoiseach [Prime Minister] and Minister for Justice today indicating the figure could be 1,800.

Speaking to Morning Ireland on RTÉ Radio 1, Minister Frances Fitzgerald said:

“The numbers are clearly going to increase, they have to increase to deal with the humanitarian crisis.

“It’s very hard to put a number on it, we want to respond in as humanitarian way as possible.

If the figure of 150,000 is put on the table, that will affectively mean a trebling of what we had committed to already. I believe that is a minimum of the response we will be making towards next week.

“If that figure is agreed at European level, that brings us to a figure of 1,800.”

Asked if that figure was a maximum, Minister Fitzgerald said, “I don’t believe it is.”

Enda Kenny also suggested the figure could be in excess of 1,800.

“There’s got to be a clear plan and a clear strategy to help people who are so distressed by these events,” the Taoiseach said of the latest EU proposals.

‘No country can do it alone’

The UN High Commissioner for Refugees has called on the European Union to admit up to 200,000 refugees as part of a “mass relocation programme”.

In a statement Antonio Guterres said:

People who are found to have a valid protection claim…must then benefit from a mass relocation programme, with the mandatory participation of all EU member states.

His call came ahead of a meeting of EU foreign ministers to discuss the continent’s refugee crisis, of which Syrian toddler Aylan Kurdi, whose lifeless body was found face down in the surf on a Turkish beach on Wednesday, has become a searing symbol.


Referring to the pictures of the dead child, which “had stirred the hearts of the world public”, Guterres said: “Europe cannot go on responding to this crisis with a piecemeal or incremental approach.”

No country can do it alone, and no country can refuse to do its part.

Ireland’s position

Minister Fitzgerald added that there are resource issues and accommodation issues and that help from the EU won’t cover the entire cost.

When asked about concerns that some people may have as Ireland has ‘problems of its own’ and they may think ‘this is too much’, she said:

I can understand that and I have to say that when I initially stated the 600, a lot of people expressed concern to me about it.

“Now people are haunted by these images and they want the European Union to respond and provide a comprehensive response.”

The UNHCR believes the current crisis is not driven by economic migration. The vast majority – more than 85% – of those crossing the Mediterranean into Europe are refugees, not economic migrants.

Fitzgerald added that we already have 400 people in our direct provision that have to be taken into account:

“We have had a 50% increase already in asylum seekers coming to Ireland by various means this year.

We’re coming from a situation where there has been high levels of unemployment, but I think when you see what’s happening across the European Union, this is an issue of life and death.

Additional reporting by AFP.
http://www.thejournal.ie/ireland-refugees-migrants-number-2310722-Sep2015/

 

[Lilbitsnana]

News_Executive ‏@News_Executive 4m4 minutes ago

BREAKING : 300 migrants escape from Hungary refugee border camp near the border with Serbia.


ETA 6:05 AM CDT:

TahrirSy تحرير سوري ‏@TahrirSy 8m8 minutes ago

#BREAKING #Hungary closes Roszke border crossing after 300 migrants escape from camp: police

 

[Lilbitsnana]

News_Executive ‏@News_Executive 5m5 minutes ago

BREAKING: Migrants detained in #Hungary have left eastern railway station saying they will walk to Austria

 

[Melodi]

Well here is an interesting idea, just buy an Island and ship everyone there..hmmmm


Egyptian billionaire Naguib Sawaris offers to 'buy island' in Mediterranean to help refugees

Comes amid growing public pressure for a change in European policy
Rose Troup Buchanan Author Biography

Friday 04 September 2015

An Egyptian billionaire says he has considered buying an island in the Mediterranean to help house refugees fleeing conflict and instability.

Naguib Sawiris tweeted his “crazy idea” earlier this week, offering to purchase one of the empty islands that cluster off the coasts of Italy and Greece.

When asked if his idea could actually work, Mr Sawiris said: “Of course it's feasible."

"You have dozens of islands which are deserted and could accommodate hundreds of thousands of refugees."

Mr Sawiris, who has an estimated net worth of $2.9billion, said although the idea could be problematic, something needed to be done to help the tens of thousands of people attempting to reach Europe in search of a better life.

"The way they are being treated now, they are being treated like cattle," he claimed to AFP.

The billionaire’s company Orascom TMT, which operates mobile networks across some African and Middle Eastern nations, is Egypt’s largest employer.

More than 2,000 people have died attempting to cross the Mediterranean this year. Earlier this month, a photograph of three-year-old Syrian Aylan Kurdi dead on a beach in Turkey prompted a huge outburst of public support for a change to the EU’s current policy.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/w...-mediterranean-to-help-refugees-10486139.html

 

[somdwatcher]

Eastern and Central Europe are currently subject to an incredible "Syrian/Islamic" immigration influx 3000 to 4000 per DAY and were also subjected to a massive disaster during WW2 and WERE NEVER subjected to the same criminal ends as were the Nuremberg "criminals" of the Nazi party of Germany.......AKA look at the attitudes of Ukrainian elements of government. Just recently, Hungary has built a border fence in response to this mass "immigration" issue, Austria is talking of doing the same. This issue is a ticking bomb.....

 

[somdwatcher]

The Central European nations should stick up their middle finger to the EU over this immigration disaster and take whatever measures they need to solve the local issues.

 

[Melodi]

German police forced to ask public to stop bringing donations for refugees arriving by train

Officers in Munich said they were 'overwhelmed' by the outpouring of help and support and had more than they needed
Lizzie Dearden

Tuesday 01 September 2015

Police in a German city have been forced to ask the public to stop bringing donations for arriving refugees after being inundated with food, clothes and toys in an overwhelming show of support.

This morning, Polizei München’s official account tweeted that around 590 refugees were at the city’s main train station, adding: “Anyone who wants to help is welcome.”

They could scarcely have predicted the huge response that followed within just minutes, as hundreds more migrants continued to disembark at the Hauptbahnhof.

Little over an hour after police announced the refugees’ arrival, they wrote that they were being inundated by volunteers with food, drink and nappies for babies, adding: “We think it’s great!”

Shortly before 11am, officers confirmed that the aid was continuing to flow in.

A Twitter post read: “More refugees are arriving at the Hauptbahnhof in Munich – help from the public isn’t stopping. Class!” Volonteers prepare toiletries for migrants coming from Budapest at the main train station in Munich, Germany, Tuesday, Sept. 1, 2015.

By 1pm, police and local authorities transferring the refugees to reception centres had more than they needed and the Twitter account issued a polite request for people to “please bring no more items” as they were “overwhelmed”.


More than 11,000 Icelanders offer to take Syrians into their homes

To clarify, a second post read: “The existing donations for the refugees present and those still coming are sufficient. Thank you Munich.”

It was followed by similar statements in English but as offers of help continued, police shared contact details for the city council for those still wishing to donate.

Munich has seen thousands of asylum seekers and migrants arrive at its main train station in recent days, including many Syrians and Iraqis who boarded trains from Hungary after reaching Europe through the Balkans.

Many more families were hoping to arrive in the city today but were prevented from catching a train from Budapest by Hungarian authorities.

Police temporarily stopped all westbound international departures from Keleti station and forced hundreds of migrants outside, where they protested by waving their tickets and chanting “Germany! Germany!”.

The stoppage came after scuffles broke out after police scuffled with passengers pushing towards platform gates where a train was scheduled to leave for Austria and Germany.

Mohammed, a 24-year-old economist from the Syrian city of Aleppo, told the Associated Press he spent €200 (£150) on a ticket to Munich and was told by police last night that he would be allowed to travel.

But despite showing a Syrian passport to officers guarding the platform, they denied him passage on Tuesday because he did not have a Schengen visa.

Germany is currently leading Europe for taking in asylum seekers, receiving more than 73,000 first-time claims in the first three months of this year alone, compared to just 7,300 in the UK.

The country’s government has predicted that 800,000 refugees will arrive this year and Angela Merkel urged citizens to welcome them yesterday, instead of being swayed by the “hate” spread by far-right groups.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/w...-for-refugees-arriving-by-train-10481522.html