Visegrad Group of nations calls for stronger protection of external European Union borders

“If another wave of migration sweeps in this spring, we need to be ready to help not only Greece, but also Macedonia, Bulgaria and other countries along the Balkan route to protect their borders”. “To all those talking of excluding Greece from Schengen, thinking this is a solution to the migration crisis, I say no, it is not”.

“Such statements are provocative and unacceptable as they are essentially perceived as a direct threat against Greece”, Marina Chryssoveloni, spokesman of the parliamentary group of the Independent Greeks, the junior party in the two-partite coalition government of Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, said characteristically in a press release.

Fico also rejected the criticisms of the Visegrad V4 countries for their too hard approach to refugees.

The meeting of the so-called Visegrád Group of four nations, yesterday celebrating their 25th anniversary as a political power bloc has been discussing sending military and materiel aid – troops, border police, and barbed wire – to Macedonia and Bulgaria in the south. The plan accepts the idea that Greece is already a failed state and has no capacity to control its own borders, so what the leaders have dubbed a “backup border” is now required.

“Despite all rhetorics, the V4 talks have confirmed that we are witnessing the end of the Schengen Area in its current shape”, Fiala said, adding that the suspended Schengen membership of Greece and its subsequent exclusion has become a more and more realistic alternative.

For his part, the Bulgarian Prime Minister took the position that the external borders of the European Union should be sealed and that migrants should cross only through border crossing points.

In the eyes of some, calls by Merkel and others for all European Union nations to accept migrants recall an ugly chapter in history, when Nazi Germany dictated an extremist ideology to its eastern neighbors. “These voices are significant and visible, not only in Hungary but also in the Balkans and also in Austria, not to mention radicals in Germany or France”.

He said “unsolved problems” remained and there was “an extra mile” to go before reaching an agreement, with the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia having concerns.

Czech Prime Minister Bohuslav Sobotka is expected to present the V4 position to Council President Donald Tusk in Prague today. “People in Western Europe are starting to adopt the language of Orban. But they do not recognize the fact that Greece fulfils its pledges regarding the management of refugee flows”, she stressed.

V-4 leaders are walking a delicate line, and their summit declaration in Prague this week was conciliatory.

“We are determined to work actively and resolutely to prevent… new dividing lines”.

“The refugee crisis has put a particularly high pressure on the countries along the route and Europe must stand united in tackling this situation”. Earlier this month, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said of Greece: “If it were only up to us central Europeans, that region would have been closed off long ago”.