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EUROPEAN UNION

EU to resettle 61,000 refugees across Europe over next two years

The European Union has committed to resettling nearly 61,000 refugees in some of its member countries over the next two years. Around 20 percent of world's refugees have been welcomed by the bloc over the last three years.

Published: 14 December 2023 13:19 CET
EU to resettle 61,000 refugees across Europe over next two years
Refugees in Athens Greece. The EU is to settle 61,000 across the bloc over next two years. Photo by Louisa GOULIAMAKI / AFP

“We have, since 2015, resettled and through humanitarian admission programmes giving protection to 175,000 people in the European Union,” European Home Affairs Commissioner Ylva Johansson told a press conference on the margins of the United Nations’ Global Refugee Forum in Geneva on Thursday.

“And now, I am happy to announce that for 2024 and 2025 I have, from 14 member states, pledges for resettlement and humanitarian admission (for) … almost 61,000 people,” she said.

Around 31,000 of that total would be resettled via programmes run by the UN refugee agency (UNHCR).

Johansson said the figure was slightly higher than in recent years.

She did not say which 14 of the 27 EU member states would be taking in the refugees.

The UNHCR’s resettlement programmes enable people who have officially sought protection in one country to be transferred to another country that has agreed to admit them, afford them international protection and ultimately give them permanent residence.

Johansson said that over the past three years, bloc members had granted protection to approximately one million people, which meant that the EU was hosting “20 percent of the world’s refugees”.

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ECONOMY

France and Italy face spending rebuke from EU

The European Union was expected to issue warnings to France, Italy and several other governments over excessive spending after new budget rules came into force this year.

Published: 19 June 2024 08:59 CEST
France and Italy face spending rebuke from EU

The rebuke comes at a particularly difficult moment for France, where both the far left and far right are piling up spending promises ahead of snap polls triggered by President Emmanuel Macron’s crushing EU election defeat.

This will be the first time Brussels has reprimanded nations since the EU suspended the rules because of the 2020 Covid pandemic and the energy crisis triggered by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, as states propped up businesses and households with public money.

The EU spent two years during the suspension overhauling budget rules to make them more workable and give greater leeway for investment in critical areas, like defence.

But two sacred goals remain: a state’s debt must not go higher than 60 percent of national output, with a public deficit – the shortfall between government revenue and spending – of no more than three percent.

The European Commission will publish assessments of the 27 EU states’ budgets and economies on Wednesday, and is expected to point out that some 10 countries including Belgium, France and Italy, have deficits higher than three percent.

The EU’s executive arm has threatened to launch excessive deficit procedures, which kickstart a process forcing a debt-overloaded country to negotiate a plan with Brussels to get back on track.

Such a move would need approval by EU finance ministers in July.

Countries failing to remedy the situation can in theory be hit with fines of 0.1 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) a year, until action is taken to address the violation.

In practice, though, the commission has never gone as far as levying fines, fearing it could trigger unintended political consequences and hurt a state’s economy.

The EU countries with the highest deficit-to-GDP ratios last year were Italy (7.4 percent), Hungary (6.7 percent), Romania (6.6 percent), France (5.5 percent) and Poland (5.1 percent).

They may face the excessive deficit procedures, alongside Slovakia, Malta and Belgium, which also have deficits above three percent, according to Andreas Eisl, expert at the Jacques Delors Institute.

The picture is complicated for three other countries, Eisl said. Spain and the Czech Republic exceeded the three percent limit in 2023 but should be back in line this year.

Meanwhile, Estonia’s deficit-to-GDP ratio is above three percent – but its debt is around 20 percent of GDP, significantly below the 60 percent limit.

The commission will look at the states’ data in 2023 but “will also take into account the developments expected for 2024 and beyond”, the expert told AFP.

Member states must send their multi-annual spending plans by October for the EU to scrutinise and the commission will then publish its recommendations in November.

Under the new rules, countries with an excessive deficit must reduce it by 0.5 points each year, which would require a massive undertaking at a moment when states need to pour money into the green and digital transition, as well as defence.

Adopted in 1997 ahead of the arrival of the single currency in 1999, the rules known as the Stability and Growth Pact seek to prevent lax budgetary policies, a concern of Germany, by setting the strict goal of balanced accounts.

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