The refugee crisis

The refugee crisis around the world is on the rising scale and the international commiunity at large looks on with a muted stupefaction. All these summits and announcements on the refugee deadlock reminds me of the mad Nazi scientist Dr. Strangelove trying to suggest a solution to stop B-52 bomber from unloading its H-bomb on Russia, thus fuelling a world-ending nuclear war.

The heads of European Union countries met and agreed on a solution to tackle the floating refugee boats in the Mediterranean. However, the bureaucrats could not agree on a unified interpretation of the agreement, hailed as a vehicle of cementing European unity. The leaders of France and Italy are back again to exchanging accusations of failure to honour their respective commitments.

Last week, the candidate of US President Donald Trump for the position of director general of the United Nations International Organisation for Migration (IOM) failed to get sufficient votes and lost to the candidate from Portugal. Although an American has been serving as head of the IOM for more than forty years and the US donates more than one third of the IOM’s budget, the US nominee was rejected. Delegates are wary of Trump’s policies on migration and barring entry of citizens from seven countries, five of which are predominantly Muslim, to the US.

Migration and refugee issues are already causing steep influence on Europe’s political coalitions, political parties’ membership and on bringing right-wing xenophobic persons to political power. Yet, migration continues, and the causes of these migratory waves are blatantly worsening by the day; namely, wars and wretched living.

Now Jordan finds itself right smack in the midst of yet another refugee crisis. The war which the Syrian government is launching in southwestern Syria, near the Jordanian border, has caused the mass movement of one hundred thousand refugees to the border. The number promises to grow faster as the war continues.

Jordanian officials were quick to pronounce across social media outlets and to newspapers that Jordan has already taken more refugees than it can absorb. Thus, it tightened security at its borders and sent caravans of military trucks carrying humanitarian aid to the refugees on the other side of the border. The UN staff received the goods and took them inside Syria to distribute them as they see fit. Iraq also closed its western borders on the same grounds.

Jordan, which is under pressure to take more refugees, has already done for Syrian refugees stranded on the borders more than the world has done. Moreover, Jordan’s security warrants such actions in fear of terrorist elements sneaking in.

While there is no denial that Syrians are an added asset to Jordan if the flow is regulated to fit Jordan’s needs and capacity, the current mode is burdensome, and Jordan’s economy cannot take it anymore.