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Merkel: EU Can't Let Greece Plunge into Chaos Over Refugee Crisis

By Philip Chrysopoulos

Merkel_refugGerman Chancellor Angela Merkel said on Sunday that the European Union cannot allow Greece to plunge into “chaos” by shutting European borders to refugees.
Speaking in a television interview, the German chancellor said inter alia: “Do you seriously believe that all the euro states that last year fought all the way to keep Greece in the eurozone — and we were the strictest — can one year later allow Greece to, in a way, plunge into chaos?”
At the moment, about 22,000 refugees are stranded on Greek soil, unable to cross to northern Europe after Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia shut its borders. It is estimated that the number will rise to 70,000 in the next few weeks.
Merkel criticized the move by Austria and several Balkan countries to introduce border controls, trapping asylum seekers in Greece as refugee boats continue to arrive from Turkey on a daily basis. FYROM, Serbia, Croatia and Slovenia, tightened entry conditions creating a bottleneck in Greece.
“What has happened is exactly what we feared, that a country is now left alone with its problems, and we can’t allow that,” the German leader said in public broadcaster ARD.

Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras is in close contact with Merkel, asking for additional funding to cope with the situation. The German chancellor encouraged other EU leaders to support Greece rather than quarantine it.
Merkel said Germany’s responsibility was “not to solve the problem at the expense of another country but together with other countries. That’s what we did in the euro crisis and that’s what we have to do in the refugee crisis.”
Merkel defended Germany’s open border policy, despite severe criticism over her refusal to cap the number of migrants entering the country.
“There is so much violence and hardship on our doorstep,” Reuters quoted her as saying. “What’s right for Germany in the long term? There, I think it is to keep Europe together and to show humanity.”

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