The year 2021 was marked by an unprecedented blackmail from Belarus, which organized the arrival of asylum seekers at the borders of the EU. The coordinated response of the 27 got the better of the attempt at destabilization. But if the consensus on closing borders is total, the divisions between the 27 still block the adoption of the Brussels migration pact and any major political project.
The European Union’s response to the Belarusian maneuver has shown how effective the unity of the 27 Member States can be. It was done externally by imposing sanctions on Belarus, by exerting concerted diplomatic pressure on the national airlines and the countries from which the flights organized by Minsk departed.
” There are very few examples in history where European states, together with European institutions, have had a firm and effective diplomatic position that gives rise to action. », Emphasizes Yves Pascouau, consultant and associate researcher at the Jacques Delors Institute. Domestically, a temporary consensus prevailed, but at the cost of violating EU principles. Prohibition of access by humanitarian organizations and journalists to the border area, refoulements, deprivation of life-saving assistance did not generate condemnation among the 27.
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Reforming the Schengen area
The response of the European Commission, included in the Schengen area reform project of free movement, moreover goes more ” towards a reduction than towards a reinforcement of the rights that can be granted to people instrumentalised, massed and sometimes stuck at this border », Notes Yves Pascouau. If adopted, the text presented will be a step forward in terms of health: the EU could have learned the lessons of the cacophony that followed the start of the Covid-19 pandemic. The rules for entering foreign citizens into the European Union could thus become the same for everyone.
Regarding the migration issue, this reform raises questions: the Commission is putting back on the table an old proposal which would authorize flying control patrols in border areas: ” Who would operate these patrols? The commission says clearly that it would be the police authorities but not only. So who are the other authorities who will be called upon to exercise fly-by-seat controls? Second problem, the Commission provides for people in an irregular situation whose patrols consider that they come directly from another Member State. There could be an automatic readmission agreement, which does not exist today. ”
Added to this is the extension of the registration deadlines for asylum applications to 4 weeks instead of a maximum of 10 days.
Efficient control, out of sync speech
Contrary to what some politicians claim, the mechanisms for closing the external borders are working. In 2020, the number of irregular border crossings, 125,100, was the lowest in 7 years. As for asylum requests, they fell by 26% at the start of 2021 compared to 2019. The Commission, like Frontex, however, noted an increase in entries or attempted entry into the European Union in 2021 compared to 2020, knowing that last year the pandemic reduced population movements.
” VSit is a figment of the imagination to consider that the actions and measures in place since 2015 have not produced any effect! protests Yves Pascouau. Quite the contrary. The effects are there, but despite everything, political leaders at European level continue to have the same discourse as if we were still in the situation of 2015-2016, that is to say with a million arrivals on the territory. This is where there is a real problem. “
Deadly consensus
The sinking that killed at least 27 people in the Channel on November 24, when migrants called for help in France and the United Kingdom, sparked indignant reactions. It perfectly illustrates the consequences of a policy of ” every man for himself “.
Steve Valdez-Symonds, Migration Director of Amnesty International in London denounces the cowardice of the United Kingdom and France: “ It is nonetheless extraordinary that two of the richest countries in the world are engaged in this nefarious and sterile political battle, playing with the fate of a very small number of people who not only have a right to protection, but have it. urgently needed. And this, while everywhere else in the world, the UK and France expect much poorer and much less stable countries to take a big responsibility for hospitality, in part in the hope that less people come to seek asylum at home. “
What happened in Calais, like what is happening in the Mediterranean or on the eastern land borders from Lithuania to Greece ” demonstrates that the closure policies as we advocate them today are deadly policies “. ” The more we close an access, the more we facilitate the emergence of mafia networks », Continues Yves Pascouau.
The presence of migrants on the Opal Coast or the Belgian coast, who survive in inhuman conditions with the hope of joining the United Kingdom, concerns the entire European Union. Among them, many asylum seekers have lived in good standing in other European countries, but have seen the renewal of their protection refused, or fear being returned to a third country and seek to leave the European Union. The reform of the Dublin regulation, which the countries of first arrival who are supposed to “keep” migrants in their borders hope, are not on the agenda.
On the issue of shared reception, the absence of a European consensus is a factor of imbalance and setback for the Geneva Convention on refugees, believes Steve Valdez-Symonds: “We see more and more countries trying to evade their obligations: it is unfair and this can only lead more and more countries or communities to feel a form of abandonment, pressure and find themselves unable to take responsibility for the reception in place of their neighbors – or to refuse to do so. “
Change of paradigm?
The migration issue remains ” a hotspot »Of European cooperation, continues Yves Pascouau, who recalls that in the last twelve years, of the five major crises that the EU has gone through – financial crisis, terrorism, migration, Brexit, health crisis – the migration crisis is the only one. which durably divides States.
Yves Pascouau calls on the EU to change the paradigm: “ The question for USStates is to know whether they want to get bogged down in a policy of control without limits or if they can say that this policy of control has perhaps reached its limits and that it must be combined with other practices, in particular that which remains a “bad word” within the 27: legal channels of immigration. ”
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Germany, which already hosts more than double the number of refugees than the EU average (1.5% of its population against 0.6% for all 27), will facilitate naturalization and the installation of foreigners. Berlin says it needs 400,000 immigrants for economic and demographic reasons. If all countries do not make the same observation, many could be inspired by it. Like certain French political advisers, Yves Pascouau recalls that in the long term, migration does not stop, it is organized.