PARIS — France will accept 400 refugees per month from Greece as part of the EU relocation deal it signed last year, the country’s Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said Thursday.

“This week, as part of the relocation, 97 additional refugees have arrived in France coming from Greece and Italy,” Cazeneuve said in a statement. He added that another 253 were due to arrive next week.

The relocation is incorporated in an EU-wide agreement signed last summer to reduce the pressure on European countries on the front line to take in migrants.

A total of 160,000 refugees were due to settle around the EU, including 30,000 to France.

But most countries have fallen far short of their obligations under the agreement, with France taking only 500 people since the deal was signed. Across the EU, barely 2,000 people have been relocated under the scheme, while more than a million arrived as refugees in Europe last year.

Most of the refugees being relocated to France this week are Eritrean, Iraqi and Syrian, and would be housed in welcome centers or “adequate housing” while their asylum claims are processed, Cazeneuve said.

France has struggled to house asylum seekers, with many setting up makeshift camps around the capital in recent months.