Syrian refugee crisis - what should we do?

[Ol' Dirty Bas Dost]

Right, this horrific picture is making the rounds today of a little Syrian boy who drowned and washed up on a beach in Bodrum. In other news, there are thousands of refugees in the middle of Budapest, seemingly with no-one willing to take them in. Meanwhile, the camps in Calais are rarely out of the news.

Where do you stand on this? They're in Europe, the issue's here and now, what should be done?

[Lidl]

The refugees in Budapest seem to be more likely to be economic migrants rather than people genuinely fleeing from persecution. If they were Syrian refugees then surely just getting to Europe would be enough, knowing that they're safe, rather than hassling to go to Germany and the UK.

I don't see why a few northern European countries should be guilted into saddling the weight of refugees when Eastern Europe, Russia, China etc aren't even considered. As harsh as it may seem it's just not realistic to allow all the refugees who want to come into the UK and Germany in. It seems to be an all or nothing situation; at what point do you decide when to stop letting them in once you've begun? Even if you let in a few million then the next few million will have nowhere else to go and something like that can never be decided fairly.

I'd say the best thing to do would be to pressure the UN into taking action in their countries of origin to make them places worth living in. Accommodating them would essentially be unsustainable but for now trying to improve standards in camps close to the countries of origin and making them habitable would be the best thing.

[overseasTOON]

I was really pissed off yesterday with the media and people likening certain methods, such as the Czech police writing numbers on people’s hands as Holocaust like.

Europe is being swamped by an influx of migrants and nothing is in place to cope with the sheer volume so if you have to write numbers on people’s hands to group families together (this was the official response as to why) because no other means are available then it should be allowed to happen.

I’ve seen for weeks in the media that migrants are being loaded onto trains but there was no inference to the Holocaust so I wonder what happens when they get put into camps to get medical treatment, places to sleep as well as being processed to receive documents.

As for their status; be they economic or asylum seeking migrants, we can’t discern what type they are until they are processed (see camps above) and current stipulations state that they need to declare asylum in the first safe country they land at yet this just isn’t happening and some countries seem to be happy enough to make them the problem of the next country along in their journey.

France opened border controls between Italy and France a while back to stem the tide of migrants so Italy simply handed out temporary EU visas giving them freedom of movement under the Schengen agreement and therefore managed to get a few thousand migrants off its books.

What do we do? We can’t rely on the UN to enforce a cease fire in their countries of origin because the P5 of the UN Security Council (Russia, China, France, UK and USA) have dividing loyalties to certain hot spots. For example, Russia is arming Syrian government forces and no-one really knows who the Syrian forces are using these weapons against as al-Assad clings onto power.

Europe does needs to help but at present simply accepting 100,000 refugees per EU nation won’t achieve anything other than a temporary reprieve in my opinion.

Until we know the numbers seeking asylum based on fear of persecution or death in their countries of origin and those who are simply economic migrants; we can’t scale the problem in the long term.

[el héroe]

They are all cowards and should be fighting for their own country...If there is war unfortunately it has to be done

[Ramone]

They are all cowards and should be fighting for their own country...If there is war unfortunately it has to be done

This is literally one of the stupidest things that has been posted on this website.

Well done.

[asbo]

I can't think of any other situation where I can see no possible solution. Whatever happens is going to be a complete disaster. They'll be a huge burden to whichever countries they end up in, most of Europe is already overpopulated, and granting them asylum is only going to encourage more of them to make the journey. To be brutally honest, I thought fishing them out of the Mediterranean was a big mistake, I think it not only made it a more tempting option, but it made refugees and traffickers take fewer precautions, they were prepare to overload unseaworthy vessels knowing they'd be bailed out by the EU if it went wrong.

The outflux of people is going to make it easier for IS to expand, but then innocent people shouldn't be forced to stay there a human buffer between the Middle East and Europe. There's nothing our military can really do to stabilise the region, our meddling in Iraq created a power vacuum which made the situation a thousand times worse. Maybe colonising the region would be an option, but who the f*** would want to move there the state it's in? How do you combat extremism in a dignified and civilised manner? The place is just completely f***ed.

Europe does needs to help but at present simply accepting 100,000 refugees per EU nation won’t achieve anything other than a temporary reprieve in my opinion.

Until we know the numbers seeking asylum based on fear of persecution or death in their countries of origin and those who are simply economic migrants; we can’t scale the problem in the long term.

Turkey has already taken an estimated two million refugees from Syria alone. Over ten million Syrians have been displaced since war broke out, approximately 20% of Lebanon's population are Syrian refugees. That's not to mention all the people from other Middle Eastern countries. This problem is way too big for Europe.

[asbo]

I take it all back, the Independent's solved it:

[Mifune]

Just carpet bomb the f*** out of everywhere and start and new game.

[Seagull]

They are all cowards and should be fighting for their own country...If there is war unfortunately it has to be done

You f***ing idiot.

[el héroe]

They are all cowards and should be fighting for their own country...If there is war unfortunately it has to be done

You f***ing idiot.

All the truths coming out now... How that little lads father needed new teeth so sent them out on that boat another saying I go to Germany, you get a free house and they look after you, another has left his wife and children back in Syria..The list goes on and on.

[skalpel]

I don't see why a few northern European countries should be guilted into saddling the weight of refugees when Eastern Europe, Russia, China etc aren't even considered.

Exactly. Or plenty of extremely rich member states of the Arab League who have direct involvement in the local conflicts in question, and who practically or literally border the actual conflict zones, and who now accept almost (or literally) nobody at all. The same shrill British voices that have scared our witless coward of a prime minister into showing that he has absolutely no convictions that he considers worth standing by, were the same shrill voices that prevented UK involvement in Syria in the first place. Have they forgotten this, or something? So desperate are these masochists to blame UK foreign policy for every world ill, so loud are their piercing howls, that they have been apparently rendered too deaf to even notice their own successes. What is it that these people want? No involvement in foreign conflict, except to welcome the endless reams of populations displaced by them? This is a recipe for destroying your own country. There is no sensible reason for European citizens to start heaping blame onto their own countries when other nations have much much more to answer for.

[Dr. Bishop]

Or plenty of extremely rich member states of the Arab League who have direct involvement in the local conflicts in question, and who practically or literally border the actual conflict zones, and who now accept almost (or literally) nobody at all.

Whilst I agree that member states of the Arab League, particularly the Gulf states, should do more, there are issues with this happening. Firstly, the majority of the members have their own oppressive governments/monarchs, which raises the question would the majority of fleeing Syrians want to go there considering it is likely they supported the original Syrian uprising. Secondly, a number of the Arab League members have also experienced their own political unrest and thus could be reluctant to accept people who could potentially cause further unrest. This likely wouldn't be so much of an issue if the acceptance of the refugees was on a temporary basis, but with the war in Syria not showing any signs of an end the refugees will likely need permanent residency.

The same shrill British voices that have scared our witless coward of a prime minister into showing that he has absolutely no convictions that he considers worth standing by, were the same shrill voices that prevented UK involvement in Syria in the first place. Have they forgotten this, or something? So desperate are these masochists to blame UK foreign policy for every world ill, so loud are their piercing howls, that they have been apparently rendered too deaf to even notice their own successes.What is it that these people want? No involvement in foreign conflict, except to welcome the endless reams of populations displaced by them? This is a recipe for destroying your own country. There is no sensible reason for European citizens to start heaping blame onto their own countries when other nations have much much more to answer for.

I'd hardly say it was shrill British voices that prevented UK involvement in Syria, it's far more complex than that and the MPs who voted no for action are far more likely to have been dissuaded by the issues surrounding any action and recent military interventions than the voices of the public. Also I doubt that these shrilled British voices want to welcome an endless ream of the displaced population, but instead simply feel we could do more to help in a humanitarian crisis.

Despite what I think of Cameron and the Tories, I think its harsh to say that he has no convictions worth standing for. Lets not forget that he is attempting to renegotiate our membership in the EU to a status that he believes will be better for the country (it doesn't matter if you agree with the changes or not), but has remained defiant to German, French and Italian pressure to take refugees that have already fled to Europe and in doing so has probably damaged any hope he had for renegotiation.

[skalpel]

The argument I'm making is against the root of a specific prevalent opinion among the general public, not with MPs (and I've just noticed that the manner in which I quoted the other post and opened mine probably muddied this). The passionate anti-middle-eastern-war sentiment got what it wanted (no British military involvement in the Syrian civil war) and yet still these people can be found in the mainstream press complaining that we are not taking responsibility for a tragedy that "we have created". It's a hand-wringing and solipsistic idea which wants to focus blame onto the West which is due elsewhere.

So, yeah, many of your points are valid and well expressed. For instance:

Firstly, the majority of the members have their own oppressive governments/monarchs, which raises the question would the majority of fleeing Syrians want to go there considering it is likely they supported the original Syrian uprising.

Absolutely true. And where is the respective outrage from these hypocrites? Where, among the "No more imperialist wars!" "Hands off the Middle East!" placards, and now among the guilt-sodden articles in the press about our "failure" to help Syrians can we find appropriate ire directed at theocratic oppressive regimes who, not content with enslaving subcontinental Asians and harassing minorities at home, have actively involved themselves in the Syrian conflict and now refuse to do squat?

Regarding Mr. Cameron and his "no convictions that he considers worth standing by", I'm referencing his recent immediate bowing to public demand and media hysteria in the wake of a particularly sad photograph. Hyperbole, sure, but he hasn't got, shall we say, a particularly good reputation for determination - even conservatives think he's a drip - and I felt like throwing this recent squirm of his into my paragraph because it's typical of the sort of PM he has always been.

has remained defiant to German, French and Italian pressure to take refugees that have already fled to Europe and in doing so has probably damaged any hope he had for renegotiation.

And then he changes his mind on the principle of accepting refugees and says we've not been doing enough, lets start accepting loads more people. This is what I'm getting at; the man is a fool.

[Duke]

They are all cowards and should be fighting for their own country...If there is war unfortunately it has to be done

This is literally one of the stupidest things that has been posted on this website.

Well done.

[Chappy]

I don't see why a few northern European countries should be guilted into saddling the weight of refugees when Eastern Europe, Russia, China etc aren't even considered.

Good point... but I imagine very few (if any) refugees want to live in those places. I know if I was in their shoes living in Western Europe would be preferable over those places you mentioned.

[PTAO?]

I don't see why a few northern European countries should be guilted into saddling the weight of refugees when Eastern Europe, Russia, China etc aren't even considered.

Good point... but I imagine very few (if any) refugees want to live in those places. I know if I was in their shoes living in Western Europe would be preferable over those places you mentioned.

But the point is that they shouldn't just be going wherever they want, they are supposed to be escaping danger and they should be going to the easiest-to-get-to safe place. If they then want to move to a more attractive country, they should have to follow the same procedure as anyone else.

[skalpel]

I don't see why a few northern European countries should be guilted into saddling the weight of refugees when Eastern Europe, Russia, China etc aren't even considered.

Good point... but I imagine very few (if any) refugees want to live in those places. I know if I was in their shoes living in Western Europe would be preferable over those places you mentioned.

Western Europe's preferableness wouldn't be sustainable if it always held open its doors as the new home to war-ravaged people the world over though. Nobody likes the idea of turning people away, but there is no sense in taking on an unsustainable number of people, especially when Europe is still learning how to change in order to manage the effects of the last half century's immigration.

[Chappy]

I'm not saying we should let them all in - we can't. But I'm seeing a lot of hatred towards them and it's bollocks. It's not their fault.

I know a lot have fled to Germany but haven't more gone to Turkey?

[skalpel]

Where's the hatred? (Genuine question, I'm not being snide. All I've seen is news articles telling everyone to stop hating and they never have any quotes or sources to point at.)

Yeah, Turkey has taken in about 1.8m I think, and Lebanon 1.2m. It's also apparently the case that a good number of people are leaving Turkey after having claimed asylum in order to try for somewhere in Europe.

[Chappy]

I didn't mean on this forum, I meant online in general.