Athens skeptical of EU border guard plan

Greece’s European affairs minister has reacted to European Commission plans for a single border and coast guard that can be deployed on a nation’s soil without the consent of its government saying that guarding national borders is a sovereign affair.

“Athens’s view is that all member states need to examine a single border protection policy and rules to upgrade Schengen zone – above all, to protect it,” Nikos Xydakis said Wednesday.

“However, protecting [national] borders is still the sovereign right of each member state,” Xydakis said in a radio interview.

“We need a serious and in-depth discussion about this,” he said.

According to the proposal unveiled Tuesday by the EU’s executive, the new force will comprise of aircraft, unmanned drones, ships and have a stand-by border troop of 1,500 officers, ready to be deployed at three days’ notice to plug gaps in the Schengen zone’s external border.