Refugees arrive in boats on European shores. Ben White/ CAFOD. Flickr. Some rights reserved.The images of refugees fleeing war zones and seeking any means to enter territories more stable than where they came from accompany violent conflicts wherever they take place in the world. The images of refugees fleeing to Europe from the regional war in Syria and Iraq have been particularly poignant in 2015.
The stories of the paths of flight, across Turkey, over the Aegean sea to a Greek island, from the island to the Greek mainland, from there to the Macedonian border and then across Macedonia and Serbia into Austria, possibly passing through Hungary, Croatia and Slovenia are extraordinary. People have been reaching for maps of Europe to figure out what is going on. Everyone is concerned and anxious about the fate of the refugees, but policy makers in a number of Europe’s states have also been concerned about the consequences of arrivals of substantial numbers of refugees in their country. They have been shamed by the German response of welcome. In some cases, policy makers and media in a few member states seek proof that the German welcoming response was a mistake.
“Another Schengen state”
One of the most startling and unanticipated outcomes of the rather erratic way in which refugees have been moving across the European continent has been new stresses on the Schengen free travel area comprised of 26 states, mainly Member States of the European Union (except Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Ireland and the UK) but with a few EFTA states (Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Sweden). Among these states no border controls on the movement of persons is permitted except under very exceptional and regulated circumstances. Yet, eight Schengen states (Germany, Austria, Slovenia, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Malta and France) reintroduced limited border controls starting with the Germans on 13 September 2015. One state has lifted those controls, and an EFTA state, Norway has introduced a few controls. With the exception of France the controls are limited to very specific border crossing points. Rather surprising in the list of countries are so many Nordic ones – far from the Turkish or Libyan borders – apparently the century old Nordic Union is crumbling under the pressure of Europe.
