Croatia will be ready in time for the implementation of the Pact on Migration and Asylum and will fulfill all obligations arising from it, Minister of the Interior Davor Božinović said today in Luxembourg.
The European Commission presented to the ministers of interior affairs of the member states, who gathered at a meeting in Luxembourg, a joint plan for the implementation of the Pact on Migration and Ssylum, on the basis of which the member states will create national implementation plans.
The Pact on Migration and Asylum is a package of 10 legislative acts reforming European migration and asylum policy. In order to start implementing it, member states need to establish legal and operational capacities to apply the new laws. Therefore, the deadline for the start of implementation is set for 2026.
The joint EU plan for the implementation of the pact will be the basis for the preparation of the national implementation plans of the member states, which should be completed by December 12, 2024. In doing so, the member states can count on the operational, technical and financial support of the Commission and EU agencies throughout procedure.
Protection of the external border is key
"Croatia will be ready to implement and will fulfill what is essential, which is the protection of the external border. That means preventing all those who do not want to enter the country through border crossings, but in an illegal way, and then present themselves as victims in need international protection", Božinović said.
He added that the Pact on Migration and Asylum emphasizes the protection of external borders, that member states and joint institutions of the EU, and not people smugglers, should decide who can enter the EU and receive international protection.
He says that the Croatian Government and he personally pointed out from the beginning the illogicality of applying regulations from the middle of the last century to today's situation.
"The convention on the rights of refugees was adopted exclusively for those people who were victims of military actions and who, according to that convention, went to the first countries that could receive them. What we have today, already seven or eight years after the great migrant crisis, are mainly economic migrants who use the opportunities that such outdated legislation gave them in order to stay in the territory of the European Union and to seek their happiness there," he said.
He also said that the new pact will certainly not provide answers to all new questions and challenges, but he emphasized that there is a good atmosphere within the EU, that everyone is aware of the elementary facts that no country can deal with the migration problem alone.
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