Members of the European Union Parliament have called on the European Union Member States to cooperate in order to launch a special visa program that would help Afghan women seeking international protection and offer them more humanitarian assistance to protect them amid the ongoing crisis.
MEPs on Thursday called on the EU countries to find a new way in order to ease the evacuation of EU citizens and Afghans at risk, especially by using safe corridors, SchengenVisaInfo.com reports. Regarding the issue, on Thursday, a total of 536 MEPs voted in favour, 96 against and 50 chose to vote for neither.
MEPs said that most Afghan refugees will head to their neighbouring countries in order to seek international protection.
“The EU should therefore support those countries and help create humanitarian corridors to provide food aid, water, sanitation, and medication. However, this cannot replace a fully-fledged European asylum and migration policy, which should focus on resettling those most at risk and most vulnerable and should include a special visa programme for Afghan women seeking protection from the Taliban regime,” the European Parliament has stressed through a statement.
According to the figures published previously by the Afghan Ministry of Women’s Affairs, over half of the women in Afghanistan reported physical abuse, while 17 per cent of them reported sexual violence. Besides, nearly 60 per cent of Afghan women were in forced marriages.
The surge in the number of migrants in European countries, mainly from Afghanistan, has caused difficulties to European countries’ authorities who are attempting to find effective measures in order to deal with such a situation.
Recently, Brussels considered as a good idea the building of camps in which migrants would be placed, despite the fact that these places have often been in the spotlight of many illicit affairs, such as sexual assaults, beatings and even cases of refugee murders.
However, in the recent announcement of the European Parliament “MEPs stress that the EU needs to significantly reinforce its capacity to act autonomously and to strengthen its defence cooperation by building a genuine European Defence Union.”
The European Parliament also called on the EU Member States to reassess the current applications filed for international protection, including rejected applications, highlighting that there must be no forced returns to Afghanistan under any circumstances.
Members of the European Parliament have urged the Commission to present a proposal for humanitarian visas, also urging the Member States to share responsibility in an equal way in terms of offering protection.