The European Commission has called on Luxembourg to fight for its new controversial migration policy, as the country takes on the EU’s six-month rotating presidency (1 July).

“I will be counting on the Luxembourgish presidency to drive forward the proposals for greater solidarity amongst member states the commission has put on the table,” Jean-Claude Juncker, president of the European Commission, told Delano in June. “It is not enough to shed a tear when watching the tragic news of deaths in the Mediterranean and give speeches about Europe needing to do more.”

The call comes after a record-breaking number of refugees have attempted to enter the EU through perilous journeys across the Mediterranean or through Turkey.

Solution to crisis?

Irregular migration increased dramatically in 2014, which saw over 220,000 refugees arrive on Greek and Italian shores. That number has already been surpassed this year, with over 1,800 deaths in the Mediterranean having been recorded--a twenty fold rise on the same period last year.

Juncker’s response to the ongoing crisis has been to propose a mandatory redistribution quota, which would require European countries to take in 40,000 asylum seekers who have arrived in Italy and Greece since May. If agreed, the plan would see the migrants relocated across the union’s 28 member states depending on the size of a country’s economy, population and unemployment rate.

A few countries, like the UK, would not be forced to participate in the redistribution plans, but they would have to take their share of the next 20,000 refugees that are expected to arrive in Europe.

As Luxembourg takes on the presidency it will be expected to facilitate legislative coordination between EU countries. And they have their work cut out for them.

European states have European states have already shown strong resistance to the commission’s plan. Countries like Spain and the UK have already dismissed the redistribution plan out of hand. France and Germany have called for a correction to the quota system, while Poland has announced it will only take in Christian refugees, if any.

Meanwhile the Italian government has threatened to start issuing temporary Schengen visas to migrants to travel into neighbouring countries if an agreement is not reached--a threat which has not been well received.

But the political quagmire has not deterred Luxembourg’s determination, with its prime minister reassuring European lawmakers he will do his upmost to see the bill through.

“Reluctant and hostile”

“Member states have been very reluctant and hostile,” Swedish Liberal MEP Cecilia Wikström told Delano. “[But] I met and spoke with the Luxembourgish prime minister Xavier Bettel, and he said he’d do his upmost. Bettel agreed it’d be a nightmare, but he backs the plan.”

Yet Luxembourg is also aware that the scheme can only be applied to refugees who are legally entitled to political asylum, which rules out economic migrants.

“We cannot accept all refugees who want to come to the EU but we must provide for those who have a political need of it,” Luxembourg’s permanent representative in Brussels, Christian Braun, said when asked about the challenges on migration. “Sometimes it is difficult to draw a line from those who should have a benefit of protection and those who should be returned.”

This article originally appeared in Delano’s summer 2015 print edition.