Off the wire
• "Maze Runner: The Scorch Trials" tops N. American box office  • Urgent: Greek Leftists win national polls: first official estimate  • Socialist Party accuses ruling coalition of "threatening" Portugal's social model  • Urgent: Greek conservative leader admits defeat in general polls, congratulates Leftists  • 1st LD Writethru: Greek conservative leader admits defeat in general polls, congratulates Leftists  • S. Africa vows zero tolerance towards corruption  • Feature: Syrians use Lebanon as transit point to Europe  • Israel deploys anti-missile amid fears of escalating violence  • Infant mortality rate drops in S. Africa  • HK must complete "de-colonization": former HK affairs official  
You are here: 　 Home

Slovak FM sees EC's approach to migrant issue as bureaucratic

Xinhua, September 21, 2015 Adjust font size:

The ongoing debate on migrants is completely disregarding the fact that migrants don't want to come to Slovakia, and even if they do come here, they'll leave, announced Slovak Foreign and European Affairs Minister Miroslav Lajcak on Sunday.

Slovakia has granted asylum to 651 people since 1993, and three-quarters of them have left since then. Another 130 have requested asylum in Slovakia since the beginning of this year, with only 28 of them still here.

"The rest have already left without even waiting to see how their requests would pan out," stressed Lajcak.

The minister added that he's trying to get this message across to his peers in the EU in order to justify Slovakia's opposition to the quotas.

"So, you'll launch a lottery, and the winners will go to Germany and the losers to Slovakia, Latvia or Estonia? That's badly thought out," he said. In response, Slovakia has come up with the idea of becoming a temporary home for asylum seekers, such as those from Austria who are currently residing in Gabcikovo in the Southern Slovakia.

According to Lajcak, the debate on migrants lays bare the differences in the make-up of societies in countries such as the United Kingdom, France, Spain and the like on one side, and Slovakia, for instance, which hasn't been exposed to such migration in its history. Endit