German Chancellor Angela Merkel was scheduled to meet with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to discuss a European Union plan that would offer billions in aid and concessions to Turkey in exchange for measures to stem the mass movement of migrants coming from Syria, Iraq and other war zones into Europe.
Merkel arrived in Istanbul on Sunday as thousands of new arrivals a day are stretching Germany’s capacity to house refugees and other migrants.
Officials said the incentives offered to Turkey would involve an aid package of at least $3.4 billion to help Turkey host the more than 2 million refugees that are in the country, as well as easier access to EU visas for Turkish citizens and re-energized EU membership talks.
Criticizes EU
However, Erdogan has previously criticized Europe’s efforts to deal with the crisis and urged Brussels to take Ankara’s EU membership bid more seriously.
“They announce they’ll take in 30,000 to 40,000 refugees and then they are nominated for the Nobel for that,” he said in a jab at Merkel, who had been tipped as a Nobel Peace Prize contender for her welcoming stance to refugees. “We are hosting 2.5 million refugees but nobody cares.”
Apart from the migrant crisis, the Turkish and German leaders will also discuss the fight against terrorism and the situation in Syria.
Also Sunday, about 40 buses packed with migrants queued to enter Croatia from Serbia, their passage to Western Europe slowed by a new diversion through Slovenia as weather conditions worsen.
Many had spent the night on the buses, wrapped in warm clothes and blankets against the autumn cold. They woke to dense fog.
Hungary sealed its southern border with Croatia to migrants at midnight Friday, forcing them west to fellow EU member Slovenia, a small former Yugoslav republic of 2 million people that also borders Austria.
About 3,000 entered Slovenia Saturday, en route to Austria and Germany, the favored destination of the vast majority, many of them Syrians fleeing war.
But Slovenian authorities said they planned to limit the influx to around 2,500 per day in line with the country’s capacity to register and accommodate them.
Backlog threatened
That threatened to create a backlog in Croatia and Serbia which in recent weeks have seen upwards of 5,000 crossing their borders every day.
A spokesman for the United Nations refugee agency warned that Hungary’s decision to close its border for migrants has increased their suffering and could lead to a backlog down the route.
Babar Baloch, regional spokesman for Central Europe for the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, said the new migrant route through Slovenia has significantly prolonged their already weeks-long journey toward Western Europe.
Baloch warned “there will be challenges if the process becomes slow or we have a backlog of people.”
Austrian police say that about 1,000 refugees and other migrants were registered on Saturday and overnight as they arrived at one of the country’s main border crossings with Slovenia.
More than 630,000 people fleeing war and misery in the Middle East and Africa have landed on Europe’s shores this year, many making risky sea crossings from Turkey to Greece.
Drownings
Meanwhile, the Greek coast guard on Sunday said five more migrants including a baby and two boys had died trying to cross the Aegean Sea from neighboring Turkey.
Most of the deaths occurred near the island of Kastellorizo, where an American-flagged sailing boat said it had rescued nearly a dozen people, with a dead infant among them.
And on Saturday, another 12 people drowned off the Turkish coast, Anatolia news agency reported.
The UN refugee agency UNHCR has reported an increase in the number of migrant boats arriving from Turkey this week.
“The surge in arrivals could be the result of a temporary improvement in the weather, a rush to beat the onset of winter, and a fear that European borders may soon close,” UNHCR said Friday.
Material for this report came from AFP, AP and Reuters.
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