The point is to persuade people. I'm persuaded, because I firmly believe that msf values these redugees strongly and that the only reason they would refuse funds would be if they thought the situation truly dire.

Think of self starvation protests, but at an organizational level.

That's one (perfectly valid) way of looking at it.

An (IMO equally valid) way of looking at it is that the EU is not 'the enemy' but rather someone you hoped was your ally. But now they're acting against your mission, in a way you feel is unacceptable. They've changed and you can no longer stand with them. In that situation, disassociating from them (with no regard for the tactics) is a sign of integrity.

Even so, their view is a bit unrealistic - if the people of the EU don't want to accept refugees, and leaders can't convince them otherwise, why should leaders disobey the people ?

Altough one could critize the way refugees we're handled by the authorities - instead of mixing them with the population and surfacing all kinds of tensions, they should have closed, but safe and decent refugee camps, and seperate refugees from the population(and also solve the issue of economic immigration). but now might be too late.

"Camps" in Europe do exist (for all the bad imagery from the last century of European history that the word evokes), but they're chronically overwhelmed. Authorities don't want to fund them, local population often goes NIMBY for the same reasons they don't want them in the country altogether. Like prison, camps tend to amplify and reinforce bad behaviour from all sides.

> and also solve the issue of economic immigration

Yeah, like that was easy :) most immigrants actually come from failed states like Eritrea, which you just can't "fix" in any easy way. I do agree that economic migrants should be treated differently from war refugees; as in, we should find ways to power economic and social programs that would directly allow economic migrants to return. Pay them to dig holes over there, if necessary. It won't fix the country, but it should stem the flow.

War refugees should be hosted and treated humanly though. Their conflicts are often "our" direct fault and we have an obligation to treat them fairly. US/UK/France are particularly bad in this, constantly getting involved in all sorts of international diatribes while rarely (if ever) actually picking up the tab when things go to hell.

> US/UK/France are particularly bad in this, constantly getting involved in all sorts of international diatribes while rarely (if ever) actually picking up the tab when things go to hell.

To be fair, US got dragged into open conflict in ME and surrounding region because Saddam invaded Saudi. And Afg because of 9/11.

There are other nations that cause troubles outside of their border and don't pick up the tab when things go bad.

-China in Korean War, helping North Korea survive.

-Japan and Korean peninsula. Japan's colonization of Korea in 1910 ultimately led to creation of the monster called North Korea.

-Indonesian invasion of East Timor

-Germany stopped causing trouble internationally only after the entire nation was put under foreign occupation for decades after WW2.

Pretty much any nation is capable of causing trouble internationally. Most just can't do it at the scale of US/UK/France, because they don't have the ability, not because they are somehow better members of international community.

They are hoping that refusing funding will put pressure on the EU to change its harsh stances. I don't think it'll be that effective but that's what they're going for. Yes, in the short term they will suffer for funding.

Say you are a non-profit that helps drug addicts, should you take money from drug dealers?

If you can find a drug dealer dumb enough to give you money, it would be irresponsible to not take it. That said, your situation has practically nothing in common with MSF's.

Untrue. Drug dealers often fund rehabilitation groups; good way to find customers, double profits, identify rats, etc. True rehab centers would never take funds from a dealer, and would be happy to go out of business because there were no more addicts in the world.

Refugees in the EU would not need Doctors Without Borders; in Turkey, refugees will need Doctors Without Borders.

If the EU wants to help Doctors Without Borders' mission, then it needs to take refugees and help them, not make more refugees Doctors Without Borders to help.

I didn't realise you meant "take money and also give them your client list in return". If you're going to add strings like that to your question, the answer will obviously be no.

I think he's saying that, "Yes, you should use that money and you should use it to hire Chuck Norris."

And I'm saying that's a horrible childish responses to a situation like this.

Why not? Often, addiction centers get money from health insurers, who are in effect dealers in opioids, etc.