Europe

Home page

Europe

Greek PM in Turkey to discuss migrant crisis

18 November 2015 22:15 (UTC +04:00)

Baku-APA. Greece and its neighbour Turkey on Wednesday agreed to "urgently" unite efforts to tackle the flow of refugees entering the European Union member state from Turkish territory, APA reports quoting AFP

Visiting Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras and Turkish counterpart Ahmet Davutoglu vowed to step up cooperation between their migration services and coastguards to beat the scourge of human trafficking.

"As both Greece and Turkey, our first priority should be to end the humanitarian tragedy in the Aegean Sea," said Tsipras, referring to the drowning of hundreds of Greece-bound migrants this year.

"This is an international crisis. No country can fight it alone."

Tsipras, whose country is still battling the effects of its financial crisis, called for joint efforts to combat human smugglers after the Paris attacks threw a spotlight on security implications of the migrant flow.

"They (the smugglers) are ... an insult, a threat to humanity. They do not hesitate to jeopardise people's lives," he said.

Turkey, the main launching pad for migrants fleeing to Europe in search of better lives, is under pressure to impose stricter controls on human smuggling into the European Union.

Ankara and Athens agreed to "urgently start cooperation" on the level of foreign ministers as well as migration and coastguard authorities, in order to fight trafficking networks and grant legal resettlement rights for migrants, said the Greek premier.

As a first sign of the new mechanism, the Greek coastguard commander was holding talks in Ankara with his Turkish counterpart, he noted.