States refusing returns face visa ‘restrictions’

EU leaders back Libya

BRUSSELS, June 24, (Agencies): The European Union (EU) states decided on Friday to restrict visas for foreign countries that refuse to take back their nationals who have no right of asylum in Europe.

The EU is cracking down on immigration following a spike in arrivals across the Mediterranean since 2014.

Italy is now the main gateway to the bloc and most of those reaching European shores after boarding smugglers’ boats in Africa are considered illegal labour migrants.

Some countries, including Bangladesh and Nigeria, are often reluctant to readmit their citizens and the EU has recently doubled down on efforts to expedite such returns. During a two-day meeting in Brussels, the bloc’s 28 leaders agreed to use “all possible levers, including ... reassessing visa policy towards third countries”.

“We can use visas to convince them to take returns,” said a senior EU diplomat, adding the move would, among other things, target the ruling elites of these countries as they can afford trips to Europe.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel said the EU’s trade agreements with African countries should also be part of the effort.

EU states remain at loggerheads over how to handle refugees who make it into the bloc, yet they have decided to gloss over the issue after two years of divisive feuds.

Meanwhile, EU countries have fallen far short of their duty to an African economic development fund designed to help discourage mass migration to Europe, Commission chief Jean-Claude Juncker charged Friday.

Juncker reprimanded EU member states at a summit in Brussels for having pledged only 200 million euros of the 1.8 billion euros ($2 billion) they are expected to contribute to the trust fund launched in 2015.

“Member states are not delivering at a sufficient degree when it comes to pledges and commitments to the African Trust Fund,” Juncker told a press conference ending the summit of 28 leaders.

“This is not acceptable and I urge colleagues to do more,” Juncker said.

During a summit with their African counterparts in Malta in November 2015, EU leaders agreed to set up a trust fund underpinned by 1.8 billion euros from the common EU budget.

Member states are supposed to match that amount, but since then they have only pledged 200 million euros and disbursed just 89 million euros, according to commission figures.

Merkel

Increased

The Commission increased its share to 2.6 billion euros in the interim to make up part of the shortfall.

The fund is meant to help finance development projects and so ease the poverty driving migrants to Europe, which faces the biggest migration crisis since World War II.

Juncker has also lashed member states for failing to live up to their obligation to admit their share of asylum seekers, who have overwhelmed Greece and Italy since 2015.

The two-year plan is to relocate 160,000 Syrians and others fleeing war and persecution by September. Until now, only around 20,000 have been relocated to other member states.

The European Commission, executive of the 28-nation EU, earlier this month launched legal action against Hungary and Poland for refusing to take any asylum seekers and against the Czech Republic for effectively dropping out of the plan.

The move starts a long process that could result in fines.

In related news, EU leaders pledged Friday to boost their support for conflict-ravaged Libya as the number of people fleeing Africa on crowded, unsafe boats for better lives in Europe continues to rise.

European Council President Donald Tusk said the central Mediterranean Sea route to Italy for unauthorized migrants “remains critical in terms of irregular arrivals.”

“While it is true that we are taking many of the right steps, the only result that really matters to us is to put a definitive end to this tragic situation,” Tusk said on the second day of two-day EU summit in Brussels,.

To help prevent people from setting out for Europe in unseaworthy boats, the leaders committed to step up their backing of the Libyan coast guard by providing more training and equipment.

The United Nation’s migration agency estimates that around 70,000 people have arrived in Italy from Libya so far this year, compared with around 56,000 during the same period last year. Almost 1,900 have died trying to make the perilous Mediterranean crossing in 2017.

Challenge

“Loss of life and continuing migratory flows of primarily economic migrants on the Central Mediterranean route is a structural challenge and remains an issue of urgent and serious concern,” the leaders said in their final summit statement.

“The EU and its member states will have to restore control to avoid a worsening humanitarian crisis.”

But human rights group Amnesty International says Libya’s coast guard is returning the people it plucks from the sea to a country where they face detention and possibly torture or rape.

EU leaders “are increasing the capacity of the Libyan coast guard while turning a blind eye to the inherent, grave, risks of such cooperation,” Iverna McGowan, head of Amnesty’s European office, said.

Libya is also appealing for help to secure its porous southern border, which is some 4,000 kms (2,500) miles long.

The leader of Libya’s unity government, Fayez Sarraj, has been in Brussels lobbying the Europeans and the NATO military alliance for help and money.

“As the number of migrants rises, the economic and social fabric of southern Libya is placed under very significant strain,” he told reporters on Wednesday.

EU leaders, meanwhile, want to replicate with Libya a migration-deterrence deal it has with Turkey. Despite legal and human rights concerns about the EU-Turkey agreement, it has reduced drastically the number of people crossing the Aegean Sea to Greece.

Meanwhile, sFrance’s interior minister said ruled out creating a help center for migrants in the increasingly tense port city of Calais, and said that the death of a truck driver blamed on migrants is also a humanitarian issue.

Rejecting demands from some humanitarian groups, Gerard Collomb said he feared that a help center would lure migrants back to the port city. Thousands of migrants were forced out of a makeshift camp in Calais in October.