A BRIEF OVERVIEW OF THE IMPACT OF IMMIGRATION AND ITS EFFECTS ON THE EU

AUTHOR: TESS VAN GAAL

Photo credits: www.epthinktank.eu

These days, a significant number of immigrants, fleeing the critical situation in the Middle East, are entering the EU countries. Germany has been reported to host most immigrants, expecting 800,000 immigrants to arrive this year. The German Government is asking the other EU-countries to show more solidarity and cooperation in handling these high influx of immigrants.

On the other hand, Germany has introduced temporary border controls to cope with this flow, even though the Schengen Agreement for all signatory EU countries diminishes this. The German Minister of Internal Affairs said that this measure has been introduced to control and reduce the flow of migrants, and that especially Munich has reached its maximum capacity hosting the refugees. He declared that the emergency border controls have been organized to optimize the immigration procedure as well as to improve the situation of the immigrants in terms of shelter and care.

During this crisis, the European Commission took the decision to reallocate 120.000 refugees with binding quotas for the EU countries. As the German Minister pointed out, they cannot host all the immigrants and they need help from the other European countries. The President of the European Commission Jean-Claude Juncker confirmed this in his ‘Time for Honesty, Unity and Solidarity’ speech. He said:

«It is time to speak frankly about the big issues facing the European Union. There is not enough Europe in this Union. And there is not enough Union in this Union. We have to change this. And we have to change this now».

The decision of the EU Commission aims for a better organization of the income of the migrants. This decision is binding on the EU members, even though several countries, such as the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary and Romania, voted against it. Both the decision taken by Germany to reinstall temporary borders as well as the decision by the Commission on the binding quotas show that the collaboration and cooperation between EU members do not function effectively in terms of solidarity and unity. On the long term, this may affect the EU as a cooperative institution and its general principles and policies.