Could CR cope with 1,800-plus refugees allocated under EU proposals?

The Czech Republic has already rejected an EU plan that would see it take in a quota of over 500 refugees in the next two years. Now Brussels has announced fresh proposals under which Prague would have to accept an additional 1,300 Syrian and Eritrean asylum seekers who are already in the EU. But if member states approve the plan, what impact will the refugees have on the Czech Republic? That’s a question I put to Magda Faltová, who heads the Association for Integration and Migration, an NGO.

Syrian refugees|Photo: DFID - UK Department for International Development, CC BY-SA 2.0

“I don’t think there would be any real impact at all. It’s not a huge number and in the past the Czech Republic was able to integrate more refugees or asylum seekers, so we have experience. Of course some money would have to be invested. But the problem is the position of the Czech government.”

Why do you think then that the government is so firmly opposed to these plans, if the numbers are, from your perspective, so low?

“I think it’s a political issue. It’s so easy to be against something from the EU. I think they are also afraid about their voters, the people who elected them.

“It seems that the general public is against accepting refugees and migrants, so I think it’s just a question of easy political points.”

But surely they represent their voters and if their voters think that taking in asylum seekers should be on a voluntary basis then then the government should reflect that view?

“I think politicians should be able to make decisions that are fundamentally correct and that are in line with humanity and solidarity. And they are not doing this.

“My view is that, yes, it should be voluntary. And then the next step by the Czech government should be to truthfully assess our capacity and say, OK, we are able to accept a certain number of refugees.

Magda Faltová, photo: Czech Television

“But they have not done that. They are only saying, We cannot be forced to take anybody and we shouldn’t be forced into solidarity.

“But if there is no solution provided by the Czech government then there has to be a decision from the European Commission.”

Does the Czech Republic really have the capacity? Does it have the centres or facilities that could hold these people?

“Definitely we had them in the past, though it was slightly restructured. But I believe the Ministry of the Interior have a kind of emergency plan for a situation in which there could be thousands of refugees coming for Ukraine, for example.

“There were centres in the past that are now closed, so they could be reopened, or some other places can be adapted.

“When you look at the procedure of integration, the actual stay in a centre could be very, very short.

“As well it seems it wouldn’t happen that 2,000 people would come in one minute – it would be a longer process over two years. And there are already some capacities now.”

If these European Commission plans do become reality, won’t many of these refugees simply leave the Czech Republic for other countries such as Germany, where they may have friends, family or coreligionists? In that case, they wouldn’t be a burden on the Czech Republic anyway.

“First of all, I think they are not a burden. Migration has quite a positive impact on society.

Photo: Voice of America News, Public Domain

“But yes, it’s an issue that I think the European Commission will have to think about and work on. Because some of those people would go to other countries. They already have migration plans and might have relatives somewhere, or friends and communities.

“But I think that it also depends on the groups that will be relocated to the Czech Republic. For instance there is a quite strong Syrian community, so if they come from Syria they might tend to stay.

“On the other hand, people from Eritrea for example – there are no communities here. So it would be maybe better to take Syrians than Eritreans, because of movement later on.”