CFR Update: EU Reaches Deal on Migration Crisis

TOP OF THE AGENDA EU Reaches Deal on Migration Crisis EU leaders reached an agreement (WSJ) for the relocation and settlement of forty thousand migrant asylum seekers in Europe over the next two years on Thursday. However, the bloc failed to agree on mandatory quotas amid deep divisions (EU Observer) among EU leaders, with France, Poland, and a dozen other members rejecting the possibility of binding intake quotas to address the migration crisis. According to the latest numbers from the UN refugee agency, 125,000 migrants have arrived (BBC) in Italy and Greece by sea this year. Earlier this week, the EU launched its first military operation against human smugglers in the Mediterranean.

ANALYSIS "We are at a crossroads and we need to decide if events in the Mediterranean are everyone’s problem, or only that of the countries in the region. If solidarity and responsibility prevail, solutions can be found: from the number of people to be admitted, to identification and readmission operations, and funding. However, if selfishness and fear prevail, we risk losing the noble idea underpinning the European project," writes Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi in the Guardian. "A solution that is both humane and workable must necessarily include foreign policy and a better distribution of the burden among the 28 member states. Whatever the results, the fact that there is now an open conversation on migrations at the highest level of the EU should be welcomed as good news," writes Mattia Toaldo at the European Council on Foreign Relations. "With this race to the bottom, EU countries appear to have abandoned solidarity, thereby jeopardizing one of the crowning achievements of European integration: free movement within the Schengen zone. Moreover, this response reflects a lack of awareness of the benefits that adherence to the principle of burden-sharing affords all EU countries. Short-term domestic political imperatives are trumping common sense," writes Peter Sutherland in Project Syndicate.