“The immigration policy of the EU has failed, it is one of the biggest mistakes the European Union has made. Europe no longer has control over the flow of refugees. It may sound harsh, but a humanitarian catastrophe is the only way to describe it,” Medvedev said.
The European Union is incapable of stopping the “snowball effect” of migration because it does not have a coordinated position among the member states, Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said in an interview.
“The EU states don’t have a coordinated position on measures that could stop these snowballing migration problems. But such a position must be worked out as soon as possible. Otherwise we will see examples of decisive unilateral actions to secure national borders. What will this mean? An end to the common European area,” Medvedev said.
Russia is ready to share experience in accepting refugees with the European Union, Dmitry Medvedev said in an interview.
"Russia also accepts refugees. It is enough to remember that over a million people fled Ukraine and came to Russia. We have a lot of experience of accepting migrants. And we can share it with the European Union," Medvedev said.
The prime minister stressed that Moscow had already made a corresponding proposition to the bloc, as Russia was also interested in stopping the refugee flows, including through its territory.
He expressed hope that the issue could be discussed at an expert-level meeting of the Russia-EU dialogue on migration in March.
Europe has been beset by a massive refugee crisis, with hundreds of thousands of undocumented migrants fleeing their home countries to escape violence and poverty. EU border agency Frontex recorded over 1.2 million illegal border crossings into the European Union in 2015.
Read the full version of the interview here
