EU leaders met in Brussels yesterday in a second attempt to secure agreement on a provisional EU-Turkey plan agreed at a summit 10 days ago.
While leaders may not have shown it as they arrived in Brussels, many were still smarting from what was perceived as a solo run by Germany at the EU-Turkey summit of March 7th. On that occasion, German chancellor Angela Merkel, along with Dutch prime minister Mark Rutte and Turkish prime minister Ahmet Davutoglu, devised an ambitious EU-Turkey resettlement programme ahead of the summit.
The pre-emptive move meant that many EU leaders were unable to sign off on the deal when it was presented to them. Since then, a flurry of backroom negotiations and high-level diplomacy has taken place, with European Council president Donald Tusk shuttling between Cyprus, Turkey and representatives of EU member states in an effort to reach a consensus.
With the Turkish prime minister due in Brussels this morning, it is not certain that a deal can be agreed. Tusk said on arrival that he was “more cautious than optimistic” about an agreement.
Laced with difficulties
The draft plan on offer is laced with difficulties. Chief among these is the legality of the “one-for-one” resettlement plan that would see one Syrian refugee resettled from Turkey to
Europe
in exchange for every new migrant returned to Turkey. While the
European Commission
on Wednesday clarified that all migrants arriving in
Greece
would be subject to individual asylum assessments, in order to avoid a “blanket returns” policy that would be in breach of international law, other legal issues remain.
A question mark remains over whether Turkey can be deemed a “safe third country” to which migrants can be returned, a provision that is not currently in place in Greek law.
The question of how many countries will actually sign up to the resettlement plan is also hanging over the discussions, given the low take-up of last year’s EU relocation and resettlement programmes.
Cyprus remains a major obstacle to any deal. As an EU member it could veto the plan, and is looking for some concrete concessions on the Turkish side, such as a removal of Turkey’s ban on Cypriot ships and planes entering Turkey. A commitment to reopen five of the accession chapters, demanded by Turkey, was not included in a draft communique circulated on Wednesday.
Challenges
Apart from the legal and political difficulties, huge logistical and practical challenges loom if the plan goes ahead. Given Greece’s difficulties in implementing the “hot spot” system, and the fact that the country is already struggling to cope with more than 40,000 migrants, it is far from certain whether it will have the logistical ability to receive, assess, and transport newly arriving migrants to Turkey.
While the EU hopes that the plan will itself be a deterrent to those arriving, estimating that the numbers involved in the temporary one-for-one scheme will be less than 100,000, others are less hopeful that the numbers will fall, particularly as summer approaches.
The broader question of EU-Turkey relations and the ethics of the EU accelerating co-operation with Turkey, given its human rights record, is also weighing on decision-making.
A number of countries have concerns about granting visa-free travel to Turkish citizens visiting the Schengen area, a vital issue from the Turkish perspective.
France and others have been quick to stress that visa-free access depends on 72 already agreed conditions, fuelling suspicions that the reason countries may sign up to a visa-free agreement is that they are confident that Turkey will ultimately fail to fulfil those conditions.
Cynical view
This somewhat cynical view of the EU’s tactics on visa liberalisation – countries may as well agree to the proposal in principle as the conditions will not ultimately be fulfilled – may extend to the entire deal.
Even if a deal is agreed on paper, few believe that it is workable in practice, and certainly not to the extent that is needed to solve the crisis.
But of most worry is the looming concern that even if the Turkey-Greece route is blocked, alternative migrant routes will become more attractive.
EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini is among those who have warned that the EU must not lose sight of other potential migrant routes, particularly from Libya.
“One year ago we were focusing on the central Mediterranean route, one year from now we could be facing a completely different route. We have to work not only with Turkey but also with all the other countries of origin and transit,” she said this week.
British prime minister David Cameron also highlighted the possibility of a new wave of migrants coming from Libya this summer.
Since Tuesday alone, 2,400 migrants have been intercepted off Libya by the Italian coastguard.
Whatever the outcome of the two-day summit, the approaching summer means that a deal to solve the refugee crisis is desperately needed – and fast.