EU to increase refugee fund

ANKARA

European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker announced on Wednesday that they will increase funds to “tackle the refugee crisis” on a press meeting of EU summit.

Juncker announced an additional allocation of more than 2 billion euros ($2.2 billion) over the next two years during a joint press conference with European Parliament President Martin Schulz .

“Since the beginning of the crisis in May the commission has not left any stone unturned to find money in our EU budget: we have more than doubled the resources to tackle the refugee crisis – from 4.6 billion euros ($5.1 billion) to 9.2 billion euros ($10.3 billion).”

“Today we are going even further: 100 million euro ($111.6 million) more for emergency assistance for the most affected Members States, 600 million euros ($669.8 million) more for the EU agencies in 2016, 200 million euros ($223.28 million) more for the World Food Program in 2015, 300 million euros ($334.92 million) more for humanitarian aid in 2016."

He also announced more funds in for EU neighbors to be able to cope with the increasing number of refugees heading for Europe, i.e. up to 1 billion euros ($1.12 billion) for Turkey and 700 million euros ($781.48 million) for Serbia and Macedonia.

EU heads of state are convening Wednesday in Brussels to discuss the recent refugee crisis.

“What we need tonight is also pragmatism, we don’t need ideology tonight,” said the EP president Martin Schulz.

More than 500,000 migrants and refugees have entered the EU this year, according to EU border agency Frontex, nearly double the figure for the whole of 2014, when 280,000 arrived.

ANKARA

European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker announced on Wednesday that they will increase funds to “tackle the refugee crisis” on a press meeting of EU summit.

Juncker announced an additional allocation of more than 2 billion euros ($2.2 billion) over the next two years during a joint press conference with European Parliament President Martin Schulz .

EU heads of state are convening Wednesday in Brussels to discuss the recent refugee crisis.

“What we need tonight is also pragmatism, we don’t need ideology tonight,” said the EP president Martin Schulz.

More than 500,000 migrants and refugees have entered the EU this year, according to EU border agency Frontex, nearly double the figure for the whole of 2014, when 280,000 arrived.