Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras will take part in a conference call with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Austrian Chancellor Werner Faymann at the weekend to discuss the refugee crisis, the Austrian chancellor’s spokesperson Anna Maria Reich said on Friday. The discussion will focus on the installation and operation of so-called “hotspots” for the identification and registration of refugees in Greece.
Faymann contacted Merkel and European Council President Donald Tusk on the telephone on Friday morning, while in an earlier conference call with Merkel and European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker, Faymann promised to send 100 Austrian experts to assist with the operation of such hotspots in Greece and Italy.
Austrian ‘coordinators’ are expected to arrive in Greece next week to identify what is needed in order to set up the hotspots and, on the basis of this, select the 100 experts to be sent. These will be drawn from the police, armed forces and other areas of Austrian administration. Their main task, according to Reich, will be to register the refugees seeking asylum in collaboration with the European Asylum Support Office (EASO) and to locate and prosecute traffickers via Europol.
Based on the agreement reached at the recent European Council on the refugee crisis, a total of 11 such ‘hotspots’ will be set up along the EU’s external borders in Greece and Italy by the end of November, while assistance in creating such centers has been offered by Austria, Germany, France and Sweden.
(source: ana-mpa)
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