Cultural globalization

Bucharest, July 9 /Agerpres/ - Romania's resident population was 19.328 million inhabitants, on January 1, 2020, and the female population was the majority, comprising 9.868 million people, respectively 51.1 pct of the total, informs a press release of the National Institute of Statistics (INS), published on the occasion of World Population Day.

Turkey's vice president urged the EU on July 6 to open legal migration routes for Syrians as part of the fair burden and responsibility sharing principle.

Fuat Oktay also appealed for member states to activate the voluntary humanitarian admission mechanism with concrete commitments and to increase the settlement quotas for refugees.

"The persistence, I can say, and the stubbornness with which the West is introducing its 'rules' is astonishing. It is clear that there is a domestic political context - we need to show voters that they are cool guys in foreign policy towards 'authoritarian opponents' ahead of another election cycle (they are in the US every two years, they should succeed)," Lavrov said.

As the world marks International Refugee Day with a record number of displaced people hit by ongoing conflicts and coronavirus pandemic on top of it, the U.N. Refugee Agency's representative for Turkey called on the international community to ramp up support given for countries hosting a large number of refugees and asylum seekers.

Turkey rescued 35 asylum seekers in the Aegean Sea on June 11 after they were illegally pushed back by Greek authorities into Turkish territorial waters, according to a security source.

Turkey is a safe country for most asylum seekers now housed on Greek islands, Greece's migration ministry has said, as Athens seeks to speed up repatriations to its eastern neighbour.

According to a 2016 agreement between the European Union and Turkey, the latter should take back Syrian refugees from Greece if they do not face serious risks in Turkey.

Turkey on June 7 rescued 131 asylum seekers in the Aegean Sea after they were illegally pushed back by Greek coastal authorities into Turkish territorial waters, an official said.

Acting on a tip, the Turkish Coast Guard rescued at least 102 migrants from rubber boats off the coast of Dikili in the western Izmir province, said a coast guard statement.

Greece on June 7 announced that applications for asylum filed by individuals in Turkey will no longer be accepted. 

"Turkey is designated a safe country for asylum seekers from Syria, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Somalia," said a joint decision by the Greek Foreign Ministry as well as the Migration and Asylum Ministry.

Denmark's parliament on Thursday passed a law enabling the government to relocate asylum seekers to countries outside Europe, news wires reported. The move is seen as an apparent break with the EU's efforts to overhaul Europe's failed migration and asylum rules.

The strategy includes smoother legal procedures to deport the rejected migrants & the use of visa restrictions to convince countries to take them back