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With borders closing across Europe, refugees arriving were getting trapped in the southern states of Greece and Italy. The political solution to this was the EU statement of 20 March 2016 to slow the arrival of refugees from Turkey.
Two years on we discuss this statement, often referred to as the EU-Turkey deal, with Claudia Bonamini, policy and advocacy officer of the Jesuit Refugee Service. Claudia wrote about the 2 year anniversary of the policy here.
There are a number of elements to the policy but whether you look at it from a legal, practical or moral viewpoint it has been a failure.
It has not stopped refugees arriving, many are still languishing in Greece, conditions in Turkey are probably inhumane, but it is Europe’s moral failure that is so acute.
Claudia talks knowledgeably and passionately about this failure. We have made the suffering and injustice invisible within Europe’s borders, and yet the suffering and injustice for people fleeing war is worse.