RefugeesEU calls urgent Sunday meeting to deal with Slovenia growing refugee crisis

Published 22 October 2015

The EU has called for an urgent mini summit with leaders of several Balkan countries on the refugee crisis. The call came in response to Slovenia’s decision the other to block the entry of refugees into Slovenia, and leave them in a make-shift tent camps on the border between Slovenia and Croatia, where the refugees are exposed to the increasingly cold and wet late-fall weather. Croatia began to direct refugees to Slovenia after Hungary closed its own borders to refugees. Since Saturday, when Hungary sealed off its border with Croatia, more than 24,450 refugees have arrived in Slovenia, a tiny mountainous country of two million people.

The EU has called for an urgent mini summit with leaders of several Balkan countries on the refugee crisis. The call came in response to Slovenia’s decision the other to block the entry of refugees into Slovenia, and leave them in a make-shift tent camps on the border between Slovenia and Croatia, where the refugees are exposed to the increasingly cold and wet late-fall weather.

Croatia began to direct refugees to Slovenia after Hungary closed its own borders to refugees.

The BBC reports that the leaders of Austria, Bulgaria, Croatia, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Romania, and Slovenia will meet in Brussels on Sunday with their counterparts from non-EU states Macedonia and Serbia.

“In view of the unfolding emergency in the countries along the western Balkans migratory route, there is a need for much greater cooperation, more extensive consultation and immediate operational action,” the office of European Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker said.

In what has become the biggest European refugee crisis since 1945, more than 600,000 migrants and refugees, mainly fleeing violence in Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan, have made it to European territory, the UN said.

Since Saturday, when Hungary sealed off its border with Croatia, more than 24,450 refugees have arrived in Slovenia, a tiny mountainous country of two million people. Responding to the wave of refugees heading toward Slovenia, the country’s parliament voted early on Wednesday to give more powers to the army and allow soldiers to join border police in patrolling the 416-mile border with Croatia.

Slovenia also did not mince words in criticizing Croatia’s decision to open its borders on Monday night, thus letting thousands of people into Slovenia.

About 11,000 people found themselves stranded in Slovenian registration centers on Wednesday, waiting to continue their journey to Austria. There were also long lines of refugees on the Croatian side of the border, waiting in driving rain to cross the border into Slovenia.

On the other side of the continent, France’s interior minister Bernard Cazeneuve said France would bolster security in the port city of Calais from where migrants and refugees try to cross to Britain. He also said that France would provide women and children with heated tents, as those arriving in a makeshift camps must now confront colder temperatures and intermittent rain.