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European Union and Balkan nations agree on action plan for refugees

The surge of migrants across the Balkans on their way to Western Europe is continuing unabated in the hours after an EU-sponsored agreement to slow the flow.

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Moving up through the Balkans they have overwhelmed many countries, with Hungary clamping down on border crossings with Serbia and then Croatia to halt the flow into the country.

He said more than 60,000 people had arrived in Slovenia over the last 10 days, many of them entering through Croatia; a few driven there on Croatia-supplied buses.

Greece’s government says it is preparing a rent-assistance program to cope with a growing number of refugees, who face the oncoming winter and mounting resistance in Europe.

The summit Sunday was called in response to a string of chaotic actions taken by countries along the route.

The European Union last month approved a plan to share out 120,000 across its 28 states to help tackle the continent’s worst refugee crisis since World War Two.

Guterres also said that Europe’s protection of refugees must be a “project of all European countries”, with the “will to receive refugees coming from troubled areas”, while also noting the importance of adequate registration capacities in “hotspot” areas for the registration and screening of refugees, as well as to facilitate interaction with their countries of relocation.

Iohannis attended an emergency summit in Brussels on the migrant crisis on Sunday.

The United Nations refugee agency will help set up the centres. “If a joint solution is not found, [the trade bloc] will start breaking up”, Miro Cerar warned.

At the meeting, involving 11 countries and held at the initiative of German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras was pressed to do more to document those arriving.

Mr Orban commented that “the border fence had been meant to turn migrants back from Europe, not divert them along a different path to Germany”.

Slovenia on Tuesday also hinted that it was considering fences, on its border with Croatia.

The numbers arriving in Slovenia were proportionate to half a million arriving in Germany in one day, he said.

Greece, criticized for being ill-prepared as a first European Union buffer against the migrants, decried the lack of European Union solidarity.

But the meeting in Brussels didn’t create any consensus on how to limit the number of migrants traveling from Turkey to Greece.

“It is not difficult for me, but for people with families and children, it is so hard”, said a 19-year-old Afghan, Habibi Loh.

Since October 16, when the refugee flow was rerouted to Slovenia after Hungary sealed off its border with Croatia, around 84,000 people have crossed into Slovenia.

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Serbian Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic warned that addressing the crisis will take time. “Winter will be especially tough for the many who are living in insulated garages, basements or unfinished buildings, animal stalls, or other flimsy makeshift structures”, spokeswoman Melissa Fleming said, according to a UNHCR statement.

EU, Balkan leaders seeking cooperation on tackling migrant crisis