Politics 360°

The entire of Europe is consumed with one single affair these days and that is the affair of Syrian refugees. A humanitarian crisis in motion and interestingly enough this situation only magnified the shortcomings of a united Europe. The reactions across Europe, as diverse as they can be ranging from absolute xenophobia all the way through absolute outburst of solidarity for this human drama. The whole of Europe in commotion divided into countries with borders and countries without borders. The contrast of reactions also as sharp as can be, with Hungary and FYROM shutting down borders, Austria opening and closing borders and Germany showing the utmost hospitality. Images of toddlers that have drowned in the Turkish shores are making the round on mass media highlighting the human drama, people sleeping on train-rails, and others holding-up the image of Angela Merkel as the ultimate saviour.

On the flip-side of the same coin locals in Hungary, FYROM, Greece are rioting against the overwhelming wave of immigrants that has completely disrupted the normality of every day life in the last months. Several Greek islands have been flooded with immigrants, who have meanwhile shown an aggressive face to the locals shouting "jihad-jihad". On some of these islands the intake of immigrants is unstoppable with their numbers having surpassed the number of local inhabitants. Angela Merkel and other European leaders are building-up a case arguing the necessity of a complete overhaul of Europe's immigration policies and the need to make more funds available in order to successfully address the economic aspect of this mass immigration.

And while all these things are happening there are also other voices that call for the Arab League of Nations to take a more active role in both, the support of Syrian refugees and the receipt of the same in their countries, which appears to make more sense compared to their immigration in the West. Instead the Arab League has declared that it will withdraw its observers from Syria and called upon the UN to substitute its scope in-country. At the same time an ISIL official made a provocative statement that 4.000 ISIL fighters have already been infiltrated into Europe hidden among the refugees and that soon the Caliphate will not only be established in Syria but also across the entire of Europe. In similar ironic and provocative tone, Turkey's PM Ahmed Davutoglu accused Europe of building-up a "Christian Fortress", when all it should do is to accept more refugees from Syria and stated that his country is currently acting as the safety buffer between Europe and the Chaos. All these things are happening at the same time that Turkey's Coast Guard is securing "safe passage" to all human traffickers to unload their human merchandise right off the coasts of the Greek islands.

On a more strategic level, Russia has deployed 2,500 armed forces into Syria these past few days in support of the Bashar Al-Assad regime with another 6,000 special forces to follow. In agreement with the US to deactivate Patriot missiles it also sent fighter jets in the battle against ISIL. The US in turn is accusing Turkey of hypocrisy in the fight against ISIL and the low levels of commitment shown by Turkey to assist the cause. Turkey deploying its own fighter jets in the fight against ISIL has shown very poor results, almost suspiciously poor creating doubt about the real intent. Turkey is also facing its own set of geopolitical challenges with the PKK these days and is losing-out bitterly on that front. Body-bags with dead soldiers arrive in Turkey every day and this is adding to the already explosive political mix in the country, which has set an election re-run for this coming November. Ergdogan in a Sultan like attitude is engaging in all possible diversions, one of them being the increase in aggression against Greece, who is allegedly supporting PKK in the fight for independence in the southern parts of Turkey. Greek airspace violations are on the daily order and interceptions are at unusually high levels. At the same time Turkey's Defence Minister has once more disputed earlier this year the Greek ownership of 16 islands in the Aegean Sea, which in accordance with a novice Turkish line of argumentation are not covered by the Lausanne and Paris Treaties of 1923 and 1947, respectively. This revival of tension in Greek-Turkish relations comes almost as a reflective response to the political turmoil that our neighbouring country is undergoing these days, yet the significance and timing should not be underestimated.

In the wake of a politically, economically and religiously troubled planet these days our senses need to be sharp and our reasoning sensible, despite the rise of mass paranoia about almost everything that surrounds us. Politicians seem to not be up to the task at hand and this lack of genuine leadership is a bad circumstance. And while history should not lose its ability and quality to teach us things and allow us to predict the signs of decline and danger early enough I still get the feeling that we are lacking the skill to understand what these signs mean or what they could bring. I tend to lean more toward the story of the child and the fire in terms of history and that provides for more worries that it does for comforts. I still hope that in my insignificance I am totally wrong about everything I analyse.