Fifty refugees from Afghanistan and Syria will be moving from Turkey to Slovenia as part of a resettlement plan that will be finalised at the end of January, the government announced Thursday.
The 50 individuals are registered as refugees in Turkey and are recognised as refugees under Slovenian law, the Government Communications Office said.
The decision is “an expression of solidarity and the number is proportionate to the capabilities of the integration system,” it said.
The project will be 75% funded by the EU’s Asylum, Migration, and Integration Fund, from which Slovenia will receive €10,000 for each resettled person.
The EU has been promoting the resettlement and relocation of refugees in the framework of the Migration and Asylum Pact, and Slovenia has supported these efforts since “measures connected with permanent resettlement are one of the more important elements of the EU’s migration policy,” the government said.
The decision came just days after Interior Minister Tatjana Bobnar, a vocal advocate of managed migrations, told a debate that resettlement schemes were a strategic instrument to promote safe and regulated migration channels.
“These programmes also deter people from making dangerous journeys, reducing the risks of smuggling and trafficking,” she said.
The move also marks Slovenia’s return to the EU’s resettlement and relocation mechanism after the previous centre-right government pursued a more conservative migration policy focused on beefing up border controls and deterring migrants from entering the country.
(Sebastijan R. Maček | sta.si)
Source: euractiv.com
