V4 against EC pressure

The interior ministers of the Visegrad Group - Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Poland and Hungary - met at a conference on migration and border protection held in Budapest on Thursday. They all agreed that the migrant relocation mechanism proposed by the European Commission is malfunctioning. The V4 ministers signed a joint declaration rejecting pressure from the EC against countries that failed to meet mandatory migrant redistribution quotas. The ministers agreed that only the strict protection of external borders, adherence to the Schengen rules, continuation of agreements with Central-African countries and support for the Libyan Action Plan could help Europe avoid a repeat of the migrant situation in 2015. Slovak Interior Minister Róbert Kaliňák claims that the V4 countries' voices are beginning to be respected among other EU countries. "If only 16 percent of all migrants have managed to be relocated, we must openly say that the project has failed. No other but five EU countries have fulfilled their tasks and, so I don't completely understand the EC's criticism of some V4 countries. Therefore, any punishing of V4 countries is wrong," stressed Kaliňák.