BERLIN (dpa-AFX) – The German European politician Manfred Weber has spoken out in favor of a quota rule in Europe for the distribution of refugees arriving from Ukraine. He was frustrated because Europe hadn’t managed to show any solidarity on the refugee issue, said the chairman of the Christian Democratic EPP group in the European Parliament on Tuesday in the ZDF “Morgenmagazin”. “We don’t always have to wait for the slowest,” Weber said in reference to Hungary, which has so far rejected a quota rule.
Weber was open to the proposal for a “solidarity airlift” that Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock (Greens) had brought up. That is certainly an option if the security situation allows it. Baerbock proposed such an airlift on Monday and said: “We have to distribute from the external border directly to European countries. Everyone has to take in refugees.”
According to the UN, more than three million people have fled Ukraine, which once had a total population of more than 44 million, since the Russian attack. Baerbock recently said that she expects eight to ten million refugees in the next few weeks./vrb/DP/zb