The unprecedented migration pressure on the EU over the week was in the spotlight of two Union summits; a third one is in the offing. In Malta, the leaders of the EU met with their counterparts from Africa. There followed an informal EU summit which decided to hold a summit meeting with Turkey by the end of this or at the beginning of next month, if possible.

Bulgaria sent to Malta a delegation headed by PM Boyko Borissov who signed the instruments of constitution of an EU Emergency Trust Fund for Africa. Bulgaria’s share in the fund is EUR 50,000 and the fact that the sum is so modest is probably due not to the country’s financial capability, but to reservations regarding the prospect of this fund yielding any tangible results at all. The money will be earmarked for opening centres in several African countries, the idea being that they will filter potential emigrants before they are given permission to continue on their way to Europe. The reservations arose out of the way some of the African leaders approached the idea of the fund – they seemed to think the EUR 1.8 million earmarked for the fund was a paltry sum. Seeing as in some countries of Africa, money transfers by emigrants account for 10 percent of the GDP, such an angle is, to put it mildly, unacceptable. Just as unacceptable as the statements, heard from the top brass, that treating African immigrants differently from Syrian refugees was discrimination. Evidently, the EU and the African countries still have considerable differences on the refugee problem, so separate agreements with some of them would be a more realistic option than any general agreement. One such separate agreement was recently concluded with Ethiopia.

The Malta summit discussed the implementation of the measures planned for tackling the migration pressure. The overall picture, however, is pessimistic and the European Commission demanded that the national governments take immediate action to put in place the quotas for refugees from Italy and Greece as soon as possible. The President of the European Commission Jean-Claude Juncker commented wryly: “130 people have been relocated, and yet our intention was to relocate 160,000. If we continue at that rate, we will be there by 2,101.” Against this backdrop Bulgarian PM Borissov commented that Bulgaria had already provided shelters for its refugee quota but that no one actually wanted to come to Bulgaria and that Bulgaria itself: “will not erect prisons to detain refugees if they do not want to be put up there.” In the words of the Bulgarian Prime Minister it was vital to check the inflow of refugees first, to close down borders and to provide for the refugees already in the country. Only then can some new kind of technological order for the intake of a set number of refugees in Europe be considered, Borissov said.

Hours before the European leaders decided, in Malta, to hold an emergency meeting with Turkey, the Bulgarian Prime Minister commented that he would be willing to support steps by the EU benefiting Ankara because it is taking in a large portion of the Syrian refugees. In Borissov’s words, besides financial support, Turkey could be afforded the right to some exceptions – such as a liberalization of the visa regime for Turkish nationals. Ultimately, the European leaders agreed to offer Turkey EUR 3 billion, to be spent over the next two years primarily on improving conditions for the Syrian refugees on Turkish territory. What conditions the EU will set down for the receipt of this money is something we shall find out at the end of this or the beginning of next month.

Two summit meetings in Malta in one day and a subsequent decision to hold a third meeting, without any definite decisions resulting from them – this can only cement the impression that the EU still has no common position and is still floundering in the tangle of the most pressing problem of the moment – the unprecedented migrant pressure.

English version: Milena Daynova