A Syrian girl looks on during sunrise after arriving on an inflatable boat with other refugees, crossing the sea from Turkey to Lesbos, some 5 kilometres south of the capital of the Island, Mytelene on March 9, 2016. Turkey has announced today to take back illegal migrants from Syria and to exchange those with legal migrants. (Getty Images).

An E.U. agreement with Turkey to send back refugees is against international law

In 2011, as the Arab Spring swept from Tunisia to Libya and disgorged its first wave of refugees, then-Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi looked at the tens of thousands of Tunisians arriving on his country's shores in decrepit boats - and decided to send them home. By the time the European Court of Human Rights ruled in 2015 that Italy's policy contravened the bloc's laws, Berlusconi was out of office and it wasn't his government paying the fine.

This could well be the template for the European Unioin's 28 nations as they pursue a deal with Turkey to deal with the more than one million refugees and migrants who arrived in 2015, and governments scramble to prevent a repeat of last year's chaotic scenes along borders from Greece to Germany. On March 7 European leaders reached a tentative deal with Ankara to send every person who arrives in Greece without the correct paperwork back to Turkey. For every Syrian returned, another Syrian living in Turkey would then be resettled in an E.U. country.

Ahlen Foundation supports refugees across Greece.