The Syrian and Libyan crises and their consequences on the phenomena of migration and terrorism will be the focus of the yearly meeting of the Med Group foreign ministers which will be held today in Cyprus with the participation of Minister Paolo Gentiloni and his colleagues from Spain, Greece, Portugal, Cyprus and Malta, the French Secretary of State for European Affairs, the Deputy Secretary General of EEAS (European External Action Service) and the Secretary General of the Union for the Mediterranean.
The meeting will be divided into three sections: the first will analyse the deterioration of relations between Iran and the Arab countries of the Persian Gulf and its fallout on collective efforts to find a solution to the Syrian and Lebanese crises. The second section will deal with the situation in Libya and its connection with the waves of instability rippling through the region, spanning from terrorism to uncontrolled migration flows, with a look at European policies to oppose these phenomena. The debate’s main focus however will be the functioning of the different cooperation formats which might most effectively tackle the regional challenges now open.
Today’s meeting follows the ones held one and two years ago in Alicante and Paris and presents an agenda that is more stringently focused on the regional and strategic aspects with the aim of exploring the links between the major ongoing crises in Syria and Libya and the other main themes involving the Mediterranean, such as immigration and terrorism, which have an even more direct impact on European countries.