Asylum centers outside the EU – two parties say yes

It became clear when the parties’ top candidates clashed in SVT’s final debate. When asked which parties want the EU to try to place the asylum procedure in countries outside the EU, SD and KD answered yes. The others answered no, except M who answered “maybe”.

You have to be realistic. I don’t see any single country that is prepared to manage the EU’s entire asylum reception, said Tomas Tobé (M).

SD’s Charlie Weimers is critical of the EU’s new asylum legislation, which has just been hammered out.

There is still a ban on EU funding of physical border barriers, walls, he said.

There is no possibility of turning back boats across the Mediterranean or establishing asylum centers in third countries. That must change.

“Maybe” good

M, S, L and C think that the EU’s asylum legislation is good, KD replied that it “maybe” is good.

SD, MP and V think it is bad, but for completely different reasons. MP’s Alice Bah Kuhnke is, among other things, critical of the fact that the EU pays money, for example, to Libya and Tunisia to stop illegal immigration.

These rogue states we send tax money to, they do not create order. They feed the forces that not only threaten people on the run but also the security of the EU, she said.

Both MP and V want to see legal and safe routes to the EU for asylum seekers, for example humanitarian visas.

“Should be ashamed”

The conflict was also evident when the top candidates debated the Gaza war. The opposition parties want the EU to mark harder against Israel. V, MP, C and S want, among other things, the EU to pause the trade agreement with Israel.

In the 1930s, you wouldn’t buy from Jews. Now you want us not to do business with Israel. Israel is the old Jew. You are fueling anti-Semitism, said KD’s Alice Teodorescu Måwe.

You should be ashamed.

The Social Democrats’ Helene Fritzon wondered how upset Teodorescu Måwe would be that the children in Gaza do not receive the emergency aid they are entitled to, according to all the rules of war.

Are you just as upset that the children on the street don’t get food, said Fritzon.

KD’s top name countered that “in your Malmö, the Jews are disappearing because of the anti-Semitism you have imported”.

Disagreement about money for Ukraine

Support for Ukraine also came up in the debate. All parties believe that it is important that the support continues and that there is no upper limit to it. However, there are differences in how the support is to be financed.

MP and L say yes to EU countries being able to take joint loans. V, S, C, KD and SD maybe answered. M answered no with the argument that it is better to get money in other ways.

Fritzon (S) warned that M and the liberal-conservative party group in the EU Parliament should start cooperating with right-wing nationalists instead of with social democrats, liberals and the Greens

Then you seriously jeopardize support for Ukraine, she said.