Spanish Prime Minister Calls for EU Assistance to Migrants' Countries of Origin

MADRID (Sputnik) — The European Union should provide assistance to the countries, which are sources of large refugee and migrant populations, Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy said Friday.

"Some of the conflicts are connected to the migrant crisis. Hundreds of thousands leave [their countries], searching for asylum. Given our experience in working with African countries, it is necessary to help them to improve their standard of living, so that they were not forced to leave the country," Rajoy said at a joint press conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel in Berlin.

The conference was broadcast on the website of the Spanish government.

The leaders of France, Germany, Italy, Spain, the United Kingdom and the United States held first round of negotiations earlier in the day. Apart from migrant crisis, the agenda of the meeting included the Islamic State (ISIL or Daesh, banned in Russia) terrorist threat, situation in Ukraine and EU sanctions against Russia.

Europe has been beset by a massive refugee crisis, with hundreds of thousands of undocumented migrants fleeing their crisis-torn countries in the Middle East and North Africa to escape violence and poverty. The majority of them cross the Mediterranean Sea and arrive in the European Union using southern EU nations as transit points.