Frontex Calls for More Police Officers to Help Greece Return Migrants to Turkey  

A refugee woman looks on at the port of Piraeus, Greece, 24 March 2016. About 5,000 migrants have been stuck at Piraeus due to restrictions on migration along the so-called Western Balkan route. Photo by EPA/BGNES

EU border management agency Frontex has urged member states to pledge more police officers to support Greece in returning migrants to Turkey.

“I am grateful to the countries who have offered police officers to assist in the escorting of migrants. We have almost reached the target for readmission experts. But I urge other Member States to pledge many more police officers if we want to be ready to support readmission to Turkey as agreed by the EU Council,” Frontex Executive Director Fabrice Leggeri said in a statement earlier this week.

Last Friday, Frontex requested EU members states to contribute 1,500 police officers and 50 readmission experts to help Greece cope with sending back to Turkey migrants and refugees as called for by a EU-Turkey deal on migration that entered into force last Sunday.

As of Wednesday, EU member states had offered 396 police officers, or about a quarter of the requested number, as well as 47 readmission experts, according to Frontex data.

The EU-Turkey deal on migration provides for  the return of all irregular migrants from Greece to Turkey if they do not apply for asylum or if their application is rejected. For every Syrian refugee returned to Turkey, a Syrian already in Turkey will be resettled in the EU.

 

 

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