EU pledges help to transition countries

The European Union member states on Thursday pledged help to Syrian neighbours and western Balkan countries in managing the refugee crisis

(Hina) - The European Union member states on Thursday pledged help to Syrian neighbours and western Balkan countries in managing the refugee crisis.

This was decided at a conference on eastern Mediterranean and western Balkan route which refugees from the Middle East are taking to reach Western Europe.

The conference was attended by EU foreign minister and their colleagues from Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Montenegro, Kosovo, Macedonia, Turkey, Lebanon and Jordan as well as representatives of Switzerland, Norway, Lichtenstein, Iceland, the UNHCR, the International Migration Organisation, the World Food Programme and EU agencies Frontex and EASO.

We are facing a mutual challenge. As partners we must respond to it collectively and with solidarity, read a declaration adopted at the conference.

“The adopted declaration is addressing an entire series of new elements of cooperation between the EU members and Syria's neighbours -- Turkey, Jordan and Lebanon -- as well as western Balkan countries. This is not nipping the problem in the bud, because the bud is in Syria and Iraq, but this is the most the EU can do at this moment on its own,” Croatian Foreign Minister Vesna Pusić said.

She also said that lack of cooperation between Croatia, Serbia and Hungary so far was shameful, expressing hope that after this conference a new cooperation and a new approach would be launched,

“It is clear that these people do not wish to stay in any of these countries, but also that these countries are not capable of handling it administratively or financially,” Pusić said.

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