site.btaAction Plan on Refugee Problem to Be Presented to Cabinet within Two Weeks

Action Plan on Refugee Problem to Be Presented to Cabinet within Two Weeks


Sofia, January 5 (BTA) - An action plan on guarding the border
and addressing the refugee pressure will be presented to the
Council of Ministers in two weeks' time. An agreement to this
end was reached at a working meeting of Deputy Prime Minister
Meglena Kuneva, Interior Minister Vesselin Vouchkov, Defence
Minister Nikolai Nenchev, Regional Development and Public Works
Minister Lilyana Pavlova and Agriculture and Food Minister
Dessislava Taneva held on Monday.

Another agreement, reached at the meeting, was about the holding
 of sessions of two interdepartmental working groups: on legal
and logistic issues. They will discuss details about the
construction of the technical facility along the border and the
technical and logistic support that the Defence Ministry could
provide for guarding the border.

The Agriculture and Food Ministry and the Interior Ministry will
 hold an additional meeting to discuss the possibility for the
former ministry to build a 110-km gravel road in the border
areas that fall within the forest stock.

The issue about the possible return of protection-seekers,
registered in Bulgaria but detected in other EU Member States,
was also discussed at the Monday meeting Upon entering Bulgaria,
 as first EU member state, the migrants are registered by the
border police and the protection seekers are recorded in the
Eurodac fingerprints database of applicants. According to the
Dublin Regulation, if they are present on the territory of
another member state, inquiries about them shall be sent to the
first country of registration.

In 2014, there were a total of 7,851 inquiries from over 20 EU
countries about such persons as 6,873 concerned their taking
back. Bulgaria has made confirmation in 3,613 cases.

Deputy Prime Minister Kuneva said that this does not mean that
the persons would automatically be taken back but, nevertheless,
 the country should be prepared. Regardless of the high number
of inquiries, only 180 such persons were taken back last year.
In this context and due to the possibility for an increase of
the migration flow in the spring, the Defence Ministry will
present a list of buildings that would be transformed into
accommodation centres for foreigners. Kuneva noted that the
integration of the persons that have been granted protection is
highly important, so as to prevent their involvement with the
grey economy.

Bulgaria, along with the other countries from Southern Europe,
insists on equal sharing of the responsibilities within the EU,
so that the burden of the acceptance of refugees would not fall
only on the southern countries. This is a common European
problem and a common solution should be sought, Kuneva stated.