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The Czech Republic will meet the commitments resulting from Tuesday’s EU agreement on the migrant crisis, Czech Foreign Minister Lubomír Zaorálek said on Wednesday. Mr. Zaoralek said a common strategy by the European Union was the only possible solution to the migrant crisis, but he warned that neither the EU nor the Czech Republic can accept an unlimited number of refugees and the quotas might mean that the Czechs would be obliged to accept tens of thousands of refugees or pay a fine.

Intensive last-minute talks ahead of Tuesday’s EU summit of interior ministers in Brussels failed to bridge the divide between Western EU leaders and the Višegrad group over the proposed imposition of mandatory migrant quotas. The Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary and Poland remain firmly opposed to the idea, and Prague has even suggested that the EC proposal may be in violation of European law.

Czech Minister of Finance Andrej Babiš has criticized the European Commission for failing to take seriously enough the Europe revenues lost through Value Added tax evasion and the proposals made by Prague to tighten up the system. Babiš’ views have been expressed in a letter to the Commissioner for Economic and Monetary Affairs Pierre Moscovici. The Czech minister said the revenue loss from VAT fraud amounted to 168 billion euros in 2013. Babiš has been in the forefront of moves to shake up the current EU tax system with value added tax paid by companies when they buy goods instead of when they are sold to the customer. This allows some firms to pocket the full retail price of the goods without handing over tax to the state.

An analysis of mandatory quotas by the Czech Ministry of Interior suggests that they are illegal. The analysis also says that such quotas were already tried out and failed six years ago when they were adopted to deal with a wave of immigrants to Malta. The analysis in particular highlights the problems of how immigrants allocated to one country could be kept their against their will if they wanted to move on to another country. The analysis will be passed on to the current country chairing the EU’s Council of Ministers, Luxembourg.

The latest draft of a European Commission plan to share refugees among EU states does not include set numbers of migrants that individual countries would be required to accept, the Financial Times reported. Member states’ interior ministers are due to discuss the issue on Tuesday. If confirmed, the news would likely be welcomed by the Czech government, which has long opposed quotas and says countries should accept refugees on a voluntary basis alone. The president of the European Commission, Jean-Claude Juncker, recently announced plans for the EU to take in 160,000 asylum seekers in the next two years.

A number of leading figures in the 1989 Velvet Revolution have written an open letter calling on the Czech government to reassess its opposition to an EU quota system for refugees. The group, comprising Michael Kocáb, Ivan Gabal, Fedor Gál, Jan Urban and Jan Ruml, said the government’s uncompromising position on the matter could lead to the erosion of the Schengen zone and the breakup of the EU. They said the public should be truthfully informed about the number of illegal migrants and asylum seekers who have passed through the Czech Republic in the last two decades without endangering the state. Other signatories include priest Tomáš Halík, political scientist Jiří Pehe and former Constitutional Court judge Eliška Wagnerová.

The Czech Republic is one of a small number of member states holding out against European Union plans for a quota system to share refugees around the bloc. The country’s foreign minister, Lubomír Zaorálek, plays down talk of Brussels withdrawing funds from states that refuse to accept set numbers of migrants – but concedes that Prague may be outvoted over the matter in the not too distant future.

Politicians from across the Czech political spectrum have reaffirmed their opposition to a revised plan unveiled by European Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker in Brussels on Wednesday that would see member states dividing-up 160,000 asylum seekers. Instead, Czech elected officials are maintaining that assistance to refugees should be a voluntary matter.

The short-term solution of the current migrants crisis is up to the European Union and not up to NATO, the chairman of the lower house of parliament Jan Hamáček said on Thursday after a meeting with NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg. Mr Hamáček said they had both agreed that NATO’s responsibility lay in seeking long-term solutions, namely in reinstating stability in countries in North Africa and the Middle East. The lower house head also informed Mr Stoltenberg about his plan to increase the Czech Republic’s defence budget to 1.4 percent of the country’s Gross Domestic Product.

NATO must adapt to the changes taking place in the security environment in its neighbourhood, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said at a press conference after a meeting with a Czech government delegation on Wednesday, adding that the migration crisis requires an immediate reaction of the European Union. He also said NATO should concentrate on dealing with the causes of the crisis and on stabilising situation in the countries of the migrants’ origin. Mr Stoltenberg arrived in Prague on Wednesday for a two-day visit. On Thursday he is scheduled to meet with President Miloš Zeman.