Croatia Demands Action on EU Refugee Plan

Croatian Interior Minister Ranko Ostojic on Thursday said Croatia was demanding am EU meeting in order to implement the European Commission plan on refugees.

"I talked with [migration] Commissioner [Dimitris] Avramopoulos and asked him for an urgent meeting of interior ministers," he said, adding that Croatia needs to know which countries will implement which parts of the Commission's plan on refugees.

The European Commission President, Jean-Claude Juncker, talked with leaders of Greece, Albania, Macedonia, Bulgaria, Romania, Serbia, Croatia, Hungary, Slovenia, Austria and Germany at a meeting on October 25, which agreed that 50,000 refugees would be accommodated in Greece and another 50,000 in Western Balkan states.

Ostojic called the Migration Commissioner after German Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere said Germany would start to implement the so-called Dublin convention by returning the Middle-Eastern asylum seekers to Slovenia and Croatia.

The convention prescribes that asylum seekers should have their claims processed in the first country in which they arrive in the EU.

The Croatian minister said that in that case, almost all Middle-Eastern refugees should be returned to Greece and not to Croatia and Slovenia.

"We want it clarified whether the statement of the German minister is the official position of Germany. We also wish to raise the issue of respecting of Schengen [EU passport-free zone] rules in Greece," he said, explaining that Greece is the first Schengen zone state through which most refugees enter Europe.

De Maiziere said that court decisions have ruled that Greece and Hungary are "inhumane in treating asylum seekers", which is why Germany wishes to send them to Slovenia and Croatia.

Ostojic...