The European Union (EU) relocated an all-time high monthly number of migrants in overburdened Greece and Italy to other member states in March, but the pace is still lagging behind its targets, a latest report adopted by the European Commission on Wednesday revealed.
There were additional 2,465 relocations taking place since March 2, bringing the total number of relocations to 16,340 so far, according to the eleventh progress report on the EU's relocation and resettlement schemes.
EU member states pledged in September 2015 to relocate 160,000 refugees from Greece and Italy in two years.
However, the reported noted that there were around 14,000 relocation candidates remaining in Greece and around 3,500 registered for relocation so far in Italy.
Given that the figures are far below what the EU foresaw, the report highlighted that it's possible to relocate all these applicants if the EU targets of at least 3,000 monthly relocations from Greece and at least 1,500 monthly relocations from Italy are met.
Dimitris Avramopoulos, Commissioner for Migration, Home Affairs and Citizenship, urged all member states to ramp up their efforts to deliver on their commitments, saying" they have a political, moral and legal duty to do so".
"I call on those countries that have not yet joined this common effort to do so. Relocating all people eligible from Greece and Italy over the coming months is perfectly feasible," he said.
Underlining that Hungary and Poland are still refusing to participate in the relocation scheme at all, the report warned again that the European Commission "will not hesitate to make use of its powers under the Treaties for those which have not complied with the Council decisions".
As for resettlement, the report said the scheme continues to be on track, with 15,492 persons resettled to 21 countries since July 2015, when member states agreed to resettle a total of 22,504 asylum-seekers.
