Amid the growing refugee crisis in Europe, Slovakia is extending its hand by giving asylum to 149 Christians who will be coming from Iraq where they are being threatened by Islamic extremism.
Interior Minister Robert Kalinak said at least 25 families will arrive in the country soon, saying "they would lose their lives if we didn't help them.''
The families will take shelter in a centre in eastern Slovakia, and the Catholic Church there has reportedly agreed to help integrate the new members into the predominantly Catholic country.
Nearly 890, 000 migrants and refugees have reached European shores so far this year, mostly in Germany, which is about four times the total in 2014, according to a U.N. data.
The European Union (EU) had planned to redistribute 120,000 of the asylum seekers among member countries, but some of the smaller, less wealthy and more socially conservative countries in the bloc were opposed to the planned mandatory quotas, reports said.
Slovakia was among those who rejected the plan which was over voted at a meeting of EU interior ministers in September, the reports said. The others are the Czech Republic, Hungary and Romania.
In a lawsuit filed at the European Court of Justice on Wednesday against the EU decision, Slovakia's Prime Minister Robert Fico said "the quotas are considered to be nonsensical and technically impossible."
"We demand that the court rules the decision on imposing mandatory quotas is invalid,'' Fico told reporters.
Slovakia, which is due to take in 802 migrants under the scheme, said Fico has no power to keep migrants who wish to move on to Germany and other richer EU member states.
Hungary is also planning to challenge the quotas, while the Czechs and Romanians are not suing EU for the planned redistribution.
Poland's new government, meanwhile, has "overturned previous centre-right pro-EU cabinet's pledge to take in thousands of refugees, saying the attacks on Paris showed the need to review the quota system," the reports said.
