Why is the Aquarius migrant rescue ship empty?
Closed migrant centres are to be arrange in EU states to course of asylum claims below a deal reached after marathon talks at a leaders summit in Brussels.
The centres, hosted on a voluntary foundation, would decide who're unlawful migrants "who will be returned".
Italythe entry level for hundreds of migrants, primarily from Africahad threatened to veto the summit's whole agenda if it didn't obtain assist.
Resettlement of real refugees would additionally happen on a voluntary foundation.
There have been no particulars on which nations would host the centres or obtain refugees.
But French President Emmanuel Macron, returning to Brussels for extra talks on Friday morning, mentioned the centres could be in nations the place migrants first arrive within the EU.
"We have struck the right balance between responsibility and solidarity," he mentioned.
The numbers illegally getting into the EU have dropped 96% since their 2015 peak, the European Council says.
The EU leaders' joint communique additionally speaks of proscribing the motion of asylum seekers between EU states.
"After this European summit, Europe is more responsible and offers more solidarity," mentioned Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte. "Today Italy is no longer alone."
But German Chancellor Angela Merkel mentioned extra wanted to be finished to resolve disagreements.
The EU's new migrant prisons?
Just a few issues stand out as wins for Italy's new prime minister. The summit's conclusions now embrace a assertion in regards to the want for boats that decide up migrants within the Mediterranean to respect worldwide legislation.
But the massive one is approval of the idea of closed, safe processing services for migrants arriving within the EU. Some say it will make it simpler to ship again folks whose claims for asylum are rejected, others are already describing them as prisons.
This paragraph is filled with caveats, commas and sub-clausesall of the hallmarks of one thing drafted in the course of the night time.
Another putting pledge is for an formidable partnership with Africa. That's the EU making an attempt to stability its robust inner strategy with a pleasant exterior one, and providing incentives to North African nations to host services the place migrants may be assessed for resettlement in Europe.
What else has been agreed?
The 28 EU leaders additionally agreed a number of different measures:
- strengthening exterior border controls, and boosting ficing for Turkey and nations in North Africa
- exploring the opportunity of "regional disembarkation platforms", that are aimed toward breaking the enterprise mannequin of people-smuggling gangs by processing refugees and migrants exterior the EU. However getting North African nations to host such centres might be very tough and Morocco once more on Thursday rejected the thought
- inner measures taken by member states to cease migrants shifting throughout the EU, which the settlement mentioned undermined asylum coverage and the border-free Schengen journey space
- extra funding in Africa to assist the continent obtain a "substantial socio-economic transformation" so folks now not go away for a higher life
- Further work to reform EU asylum coverage, together with modifications to the so-called Dublin regulation below which migrants should be thought of for asylum within the first protected nation the place they arrive
Whose wants does the deal meet?
Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte had earlier taken the uncommon step of blocking the conclusions of the joint communique till the leaders had settled the migration problem. Both Italy and Greece need different nations to share the burden.
However a number of Central European states have up to now rejected an EU scheme to relocate 160,000 refugees from overcrowded camps in Greece and Italy.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel had acknowledged that the migration problem might be a defining second for the EUhowever she additionally wanted the summit to avert a political disaster at residence that would convey down her authorities.
Migrant disaster: EU border drive Frontex defined
Interior Minister Horst Seehofer, from her Bavarian coalition accomplice, the CSU, had given her a deadline of this weekend. He has threatened to start out turning away migrants who've already registered elsewhere from the border in his residence state.
Without the CSU, Mrs Merkel would lose her parliamentary majority.
Speaking to reporters after the talks, she acknowledged the EU nonetheless had "a lot of work to do to bridge the different views".
How many migrants are getting into the EU?
The flows of individuals embrace refugees fleeing the Syrian conflict and different conflicts, urgently searching for asylum.
It will not be a disaster on the size of 2015, when hundreds have been coming ashore day by day on the Greek islands.
But this month's tensions over migrant rescue ships barred from entry to Italian portsmost lately the German charity ship Lifelinehave put the difficulty firmly again within the EU highlight.
The Lifeline was solely allowed to dock in Malta after intense diplomacy amongst a number of EU states, who every agreed to take a few of the migrants on board. Malta acknowledged that Norway had now additionally agreed to take a share.