(Courtesy CCTV) — The refugee crisis that Europe is now facing might last for decades, and yet no policy so far can solve the problem, said an international strategic expert in an exclusive interview with China Central Television (CCTV) on Friday in London.
Nigel Inkster, the Director of Transnational Threats and Political Risk at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, said the refugee crisis may last longer than many people think.
“I think the answer to that might prove to be decades. If we look into what we got at the moment, we got a particular moment with Syria and hundreds of thousands of refugees already have moved into Europe, into northern Europe. I think Germany has taken something like 450,000 already this year. We have millions more Syrians displaced within Syria and also in refugee camps in surrounding countries. Most of the people who have come to Europe actually come from the camps, not from Syria directly. These people who had been hoping that they wouldn’t have to stay too long outside the country before returning to rebuild, but have now given up,” said Inkster.
According to reports, 340,000 Syrian refugees came to Europe in the first seven months of 2015. And with the growing number of the refugees arriving in European countries, Germany has already adjusted the number of refugees accepted to 800,000, which is double the original 400,000. It has also recently announced that it will accept 500,000 refugees per year in the next several years.
The ever-increasing number of incoming refugees may bring many problems, said Inkster, which can be unexpected and impossible to solve.
“I don’t think anybody knows. There are two problems. First, it causes worries that by accepting large numbers of refugees, this risks encouraging others to come and associated with that, concerns in the receiving countries in western Europe about the potential dislocating impact of large numbers of people from a different country, from a different culture, the impact of that on economic opportunity, the strain on welfare budgets, schools, housing, etc. But also beyond that, the cultural factor. (It’s) very, very difficult to identify a single policy option as effective in dealing (with) and solving this problem. I don’t think it can be solved,” says Inkster.
According to a report released by the United Nations in May, the four-year civil war in Syria has resulted in 240,000 deaths, not to mention an economic loss of 202 billion U.S. dollars, and has also devastated the domestic medical system, education and social welfare.
As there is no sign of the civil war in Syria coming to an end any time soon, Inkster suggests it is time to build havens within the country in order to make it possible for some people to return home and settle.
“The governments interested in the Syrian conflict may have to revisit the concepts of safe havens within Syria and see whether it’s possible to create zones where Syrian people can return to and live in reasonable security. I think that would have been easier to do two or three years ago. I think it’s going to be much more problematic now,” Inkster said.