As Syrians fled the Middle East for safety in Europe, German Chancellor Angela Merkel announced that her country would resettle 800,000 refugees. This decision, among others, led Time Magazine to announce Merkel as only the fourth individual woman to win its prestigious Person of the Year award.
Merkel’s commitment to receive 800,000 refugees is by far Europe’s largest, but here are three other European leaders who have shown a steadfast commitment to resettling or aiding refugees in 2015.
French President François Hollande
Just days after militants aligned with the extremist group ISIS killed 130 people in Paris, Hollande announced that France would not back down from resettling 30,000 Syrian refugees over the next two years. This is in stark contrast to calls from American governors who demanded the U.S. suspend the resettlement of Syrians last month.
Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras
Greece is what the EU calls a “frontline” state, in that it is a country through which refugees enter Europe. Nearly 800,000 refugees — the majority, Syrian — entered Greece via Turkey in 2015. “For some the only way to deal with this challenge is to build walls higher, to repel migrants by force or to ensure that they remain someone else’s responsibility — as far away as possible,” Tsipras said, at the UN’s 70th General Assembly earlier this year. “We do not believe that the future of Europe or our world can be built on ever-higher walls or children dying at our doorstep. Neither can we forget that many of our ancestors were refugees and migrants.”
Finnish President Sauli Niinisto & Finnish Prime Minister Juha Sipila
Finland resettled more than 13,000 people, mostly Iraqis, this year — a stark increase from the 3,600 resettled in 2014. Finland experienced kickback from ultranationalist protesters, as have other European countries, but their leaders remain defiant.
“Not helping is not an option for us,” Niinisto said at the UNGA, while Sipila offered his home to refugees. “We should all take a look in the mirror and ask how we can help,” he told national broadcaster YLE.