Rónán Mullen (Independent)
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One area I have written about recently is the macro question of who gets in. All right-thinking people want to reach out and deal with people in the current emergency and the people who are making these arduous and sometimes dangerous journeys. Behind all that, however, are stories of particular persecuted groups in the Middle East. I am thinking of Christian groups in some areas, non-Christian, non-Muslim groups such as the Yazidis, Muslim minorities in some cases, and, in certain areas, not necessarily the people making the journey but possibly those who have no future in their Middle Eastern homelands, if one is to take a hard realpolitikview of the situation. It seems to be the intention of the EU to deal with those who are arriving on our shores and Mr. Kirrane has said the Greeks and the Italians will for the most part make the allocation. Is it a harsh fact, therefore, given that the EU has limited capacity to absorb people, that some of those persecuted groups may very well be left behind in all of this?