STRASBOURG, France—The European Union's executive proposed redistributing 160,000 refugees across the bloc, in a long-awaited plan that was fast gaining support among the biggest countries that must vote to adopt it—even as the plan's author noted it won't go far enough.
The EU has sputtered in previous attempts to craft a coherent approach to the crisis amid competing national interests and insistence by some countries—particularly in the poorer East—that accepting refugees must be voluntary.
But support for the common and binding burden-sharing plan was growing, propelled by public outcry after 71 migrants were found dead in a truck in Austria last month and images of a drowned 3-year-old Syrian boy went viral last week.
The new plan still has to be approved by a so-called qualified majority of EU governments, in which bigger countries have weightier votes. With the four largest countries involved—Germany, France, Spain and Italy—in favor, the odds that the proposal would be adopted.
The plan is the second attempt by European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker to help Greece, Italy and Hungary, the three countries on the front line of the crisis.
"I do believe that given the gravity of the situation we face, this proposal is quite modest," Mr. Juncker said at a news conference, adding that nearly 500,000 people have made their way to Europe in the past year.
He pointed out that earlier even more modest plans were rejected by EU leaders and that if "we had taken decisions back then, perhaps we would have saved a lot of lives."
Over the next two years, most EU countries—excluding the U.K., Denmark and Ireland, which have opt-outs from Europe's common asylum system—would be required to take in a total of 160,000 refugees who arrived in hard-hit Italy, Greece and Hungary.
Germany, the main destination for migrants entering from those EU border states, has strongly backed the proposal and hopes to diffuse the stream of people seeking asylum there. It won the support of France, which started taking hundreds of refugees from shelters in Munich in anticipation of the EU plan.
On Wednesday, Spain, formerly among the most hostile member states to attempts by Brussels to craft a binding deal forcing each to accept a certain number of migrants, announced it would take in roughly the number of asylum seekers the European Commission had earmarked for the country.
Last week, Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy said Spain would limit itself to a June commitment to receive 2,749 people, far fewer than the 4,288 the European Commission first proposed. Spain's new pledge brings to 17,680 the total number of refugees it will take in.
President François Hollande said Monday France would welcome a total of 24,000 over the next two years.
Chancellor Angela Merkel on Wednesday repeated her call for the EU to agree to binding rules, saying Mr. Juncker's proposal was a "first step of a fair distribution" but more is needed.
According to German government estimates, some 800,000 people are expected to apply for asylum there this year alone.
"It's not possible to set a limit and to say 'We don't care beyond that and it is then an issue for two or three or four countries,' " Ms. Merkel said. "This must be a European responsibility and only then will all member states care about the causes of migration" and help address conflicts driving people to flee to Europe.
Mr. Juncker said he has had encouraging feedback from the leaders he had spoken to on the phone and that home-affairs ministers meeting on Sept. 14 should at least agree on the main points.
"Europe today is an island of hope for the people in the Middle East fleeing war and oppression," he said. "This is something to be proud of, not something to fear."
Diplomats said the plan could win the backing of a majority of member states, but they recognized that any deal will have to take into account Hungary and other states that have expressed concerns about the number of migrants entering their countries.
Following the announcement, the Czech Republic's prime minister maintained his opposition to mandatory quotas, but Latvia's prime minister said her country would take in migrants as required if EU governments approve the plan.
"Latvia is in favor of voluntary accommodation, but we cannot avoid solidarity," Prime Minister Laimdota Straujuma told reporters. Romania, another large country with a weighty vote, on Monday said it would be against any binding quotas. But a spokeswoman for the Romanian government on Wednesday couldn't confirm whether that stance remained valid.
EU diplomats and officials have acknowledged they may eventually be able to craft the necessary majority of member states to force the plan through. While the European Commission has said publicly it could do so, many officials are concerned about foisting the scheme onto the likes of Hungary, Slovakia and the Baltic States, where experience of migration from outside the EU has been wafer-thin. Significant areas of EU policy depend on unanimity, such as the imposition of sanctions against Russia, and some diplomats say there is nervousness that imposing the plan on its opponents could undermine EU action in other areas.
The plan will apply to people who arrive from a month before the proposal is adopted. The people to be distributed will have to be in Greece, Italy or Hungary and have some first screening done—including fingerprints and a declaration of origin that is cross-checked with an expert.
Mr. Juncker said that while the number of incoming refugees and migrants may be "frightening" for some Europeans, they represent only 0.11% of the total EU population, dwarfing the effort made by Lebanon, Turkey and Jordan, where a total of four million Syrians have found refuge. The EU will also increase the funding for the countries in the Middle East and North Africa bearing the brunt of the crisis, he said.
The European Commission will fund the redistribution program at a cost of €780 million ($870 million). Each receiving country will get €6,000 per relocated person. Italy, Greece and Hungary will get €500 per relocated person, to cover their transport costs.
If a country can't take part in the program, for instance if affected by floods or earthquakes, it can make a temporary financial contribution to the program of up to 0.002% of the country's gross domestic product. No such exemption can last longer than a year.
The program will apply to people whose nationalities have the best chances of getting refugee status in EU countries. Currently, it would apply to Syrians, Iraqis and Eritreans, but the nationality list can change on a quarterly basis, depending on the EU-wide recognition rate for asylum requests from those countries.
—Laurence Norman in Brussels, Noemie Bisserbe in Paris and Andrea Thomas in Berlin contributed to this article.
Write to Valentina Pop at valentina.pop@wsj.com
Source: EU Presents Plan to Distribute Refugees Across Europe
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