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Refugees on arrival on Lesbos, in the background a Frontex ship (archive image)
Photo:
Michael Varaklas / AP
The European Parliament wants to block funding for Frontex.
In the second attempt, the body relieved the budget of the EU border protection agency for 2019 on Thursday. At the same time, the parliamentarians in Strasbourg recommended that 90 million euros (twelve percent) be withheld from the Frontex budget for 2022.
Frontex was recently repeatedly accused of being involved in the illegal rejection of refugees at the EU's external borders. In the spring, Parliament also saw deficiencies in the areas of reimbursement of costs, internal controls and the avoidance of conflicts of interest. That is why it postponed the discharge of the budget to autumn.
Parliament now praised Frontex's efforts to remedy the deficits.
Nevertheless, part of the budget for 2022 should only be released when certain conditions are met, it said in a message.
For example, 20 missing fundamental rights observers would have to be hired and a mechanism for reporting incidents at the EU's external borders would have to be set up.
In the coming weeks, Parliament will be negotiating the budget for the coming year with the EU countries.
The EU states are calling for the Frontex budget to be cut by 45 million euros.
The European Parliament reviews the expenditure of the annual EU budget by the various institutions.
In doing so, it grants the discharge necessary for closing the accounts.
In the event of a dispute, Parliament can postpone or refuse discharge.
sol / dpa
