Brussels: The European Union approved a plan to share out 120,000 refugees across its 28 states, striding past vehement opposition from four ex-communist eastern nations. In a move that will deepen bad blood over the biggest migration crisis since World War II, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Romania and Slovakia, all voted against the plan while Finland abstained.
“Very soon we will find that the emperor is naked. Common sense has lost today! :-(,” disappointed Czech interior minister Milan Chovanec tweeted after emergency talks in Brussels. The proposal will see EU countries forced to take a share of thousands of new arrivals from Syria, Afghanistan and Eritrea who are currently in frontline EU states of Greece and Italy. The ministers were under pressure to reach a deal that could be ratified by EU leaders at a crisis summit, but in a rare step for a bloc that is keen to show a united front, the agreement was by a majority vote instead of unanimity.
Officials said the relocation deal covered 66,000 refugees who would be moved from Greece and Italy plus another 54,000 who were earmarked to be relocated from Hungary before it refused to back the plan. “Decision on relocation for 120,000 persons adopted today, by a large majority of member states,” the EU's Luxembourg presidency said in a tweet.
