Joint meeting of the Committee ofn Foreign Affairs (AFET), The Committe on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs (LIBE) and&nbsp;the Sub-Committee on Human Rights (DROI) in the&nbsp;EP in Brussels.Keynote speeches by Federica MOGHERINI, High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Dimitris AVRAMOPOULOS, Member of the EC in charge of&nbsp;Migration, and Ant&oacute;nio GUTERRES, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR)&nbsp;on: Respecting human rights in the context of migration flows in the Mediterranean.

Committee on Foreign Affairs

Brussels

meeting

Subcommittee on Human Rights

Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs

migration and refugees in Europe (T)

EP delegation

MOGHERINI, Federica (IT, EC)

AVRAMOPOULOS, Dimitris (EL, EC)

GUTERRES, António (PT)

keynote speech

Respecting human rights in the context of migration flows in the Mediterranean: extracts from the keynote speeches by Federica MOGHERINI, Dimitris AVRAMOPOULOS and António GUTERRES

SOUNDBITE (English), Federica MOGHERINI, High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy / Vice-President of the EC, This is not something new and it is not only something European. It is a regional and global issue. Putting things into perspective, we are talking about 0.1% of the European population when we talk about the refugees who are coming, when in Lebanon it is 25% of its population.

SOUNDBITE (English), Federica MOGHERINI, High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy / Vice-President of the EC, We are discussing of 40.000, we are discussing of 120.000. If you add the refugees that are hosted in the neighbouring countries of Syria, that are internally displaced in Syria, I think we get close to 12 million. So we better realise what we are talking about.

SOUNDBITE (English), Federica MOGHERINI, High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy / Vice-President of the EC, As European Union we have established one trust fund, the Syria trust fund, so I am very glad that Member States indicate the need to increase significantly the fund, and I expect them to take the consequent decisions. The trust fund is open for contributions, and it is waiting for contributions, we have to start being coherent, if we use certain words then we have to take their consequent political decisions.

SOUNDBITE (English), Federica MOGHERINI, High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy / Vice-President of the EC, The things you hear are tales of slavery, which are unbearable for any human being to listen to, and if a mother decides to spend all the money of the family to bet them on the life of herself and her children, you understand the magnitude of desperation we are facing. There is no way in which such a desperation of people ready to face the risk of dying with their children, no illusion that this can be stopped with a fence or with a wall.

SOUNDBITE (English), Dimitris AVRAMOPOULOS, Member of the EC in charge of Migration, Home Affairs and Citizenship, Last night I came out very disappointed. I was expecting more support on behalf of all Member States.

SOUNDBITE (English), Dimitris AVRAMOPOULOS, Member of the EC in charge of Migration, Home Affairs and Citizenship, The whole world is watching us. It is expecting from Europe to move ahead in a bold way and deliver. It is time for each and everyone to take their responsibilities.

SOUNDBITE (English), Dimitris AVRAMOPOULOS, Member of the EC in charge of Migration, Home Affairs and Citizenship, The first relocations can start immediately. Priority will be given to vulnerable applicants. The first resettlements can also start immediately.

SOUNDBITE (English), Dimitris AVRAMOPOULOS, Member of the EC in charge of Migration, Home Affairs and Citizenship, On top of this, the Commission is proposing a permanent relocation mechanism so that the right to asylum can be enforced more quickly in future crisis.

SOUNDBITE (English), Ant&#243;nio GUTERRES, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), 59 years ago we had the first large European and UNHCR regfugee crisis. 140.000 Hungarians were moved from Austria into several European countries and out of Europe and relocation in two other European countries took less than 3 months.

SOUNDBITE (English), Ant&#243;nio GUTERRES, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), Unfortunately today we have a European Union but Europe is no longer divided, Europe is divided.

SOUNDBITE (English), Ant&#243;nio GUTERRES, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), But in the Eastern Mediterranean we have now about 4000 people per day coming into the Greek islands and that is becoming essentially a refugee flow. The first thing is to move ahead with what it is possible immediately and that means to create adequate reception conditions where people can be welcomed and properly assisted and then can be registered and screened to detect who is in need of protection and who is not, for those in need of protection to be relocated and those not in need of protection to be able to be returned.

SOUNDBITE (English), Ant&#243;nio GUTERRES, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), If the Hungarian border is to remain in the present situation, I believe an emergency response needs to be done to Serbia or to Serbia and FYROM but centered in Serbia because we need to have in Serbia quickly the creation of reception and assistance capacities.