Get tough on migrants, or far-Right will win power, says leading EU official
EUROPE must deport failed asylum seekers and close its doors or support for extreme-Right parties will surge, one of the European Union’s most senior officials warned yesterday.
An influx of refugees and migrants is raising fears about the “identity, future and cohesion” of European states, said Frans Timmermans, the First Vice President of the European Commission.
He said a failure by Greece and Italy to process migrants swiftly was giving illegitimate asylum seekers the means to disguise themselves as Syrians.
Two Royal Navy craft – HMS Enterprise, a survey ship, and HMS Richmond, a Type 23 frigate – will begin arresting traffickers on international waters in the Mediterranean from Oct 7 as part of a EU naval task force, it was announced yesterday.
In a provocative move, Hungarian troops began to lay barbed wire along its border with Slovenia – a crossing that falls within the Schengen free movement zone. Its previous fences with Serbia, Croatia and Romania have been condemned by EU leaders, but tolerated on the grounds that they are external borders of Schengen. Mean- while, relations between Serbia and Croatia soured over the handling of the migrant crisis.
Serbia banned imports from Croatia in response to its neighbour’s decision to close the border to cargo to halt the refugee tide. Croatia responded by banning all Serbian-registered vehicles from entering the country.
Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, said a scheme to redistribute 120,000 refugees around the EU must go much further, days after it was approved against the wishes of four Eastern European states.
“I am deeply convinced that what Europe needs is not just selective relocation of this kind, but a much more durable process for fairly distributing refugees among member states,” she said. “A first step has been taken, but we are still far from where we should be.”
After weeks of condemnation over Hungary’s border fences, EU officials appear to have softened their position slightly. Mr Timmermans said the country’s neighbours must understand that it had “no experience of diversity” after decades under Soviet rule.
“We have to patrol our borders better. We have to make sure that those countries where people arrive are bet- ter placed to make sure people are registered, that people who don’t have the right to asylum are returned swiftly,” he told BBC radio.
“This has an impact on every single member state. If we’re not able to tackle this issue, if we’re not able to find sustainable solutions, you will see a surge of the extreme Right across the European continent.” Viktor Orban, Hungary’s Right-wing prime minister, has horrified his European counterparts for insisting that Muslims are a threat to Europe’s Christian heritage, and opposed a quota system of relocation as an “invitation” to tens of millions of economic migrants. He has presented himself as a bulwark against Jobbik, the far-right Hungarian opposition.
Mr Timmermans said Mr Orban should show leadership and explain to voters that all countries would in time become more diverse.
At a summit in Brussels yesterday, leaders agreed that special reception centres would be set up for migrants in Italy and Greece by the end of November. They also agreed to help the countries to identify and fingerprint migrants, and to increase spending for the EU’s Frontex and Europol forces.
“We see that because people are not registered on arrival quickly enough they share stories, they buy false papers and say they are from Syria when they are not because they know if they are from Syria they will probably get asylum,” Mr Timmermans said.
Donald Tusk, the European Council President, warned that “millions” of refugees would reach European shores. “It is clear the greatest tide of refugees and migrants is yet to come. So we need to correct our policy of open doors and windows. Now the focus should be on proper protection of our external borders.”
Despite the warning, the package agreed was relatively modest.
Antonio Guterre, the head of the UN refugee agency, said he was “disappointed” that it did not contain legal routes for migrants to Europe.
120,000 The number of refugees to be redistributed around the EU, despite the objections of some Eastern European states ‘The greatest tide of refugees and migrants is yet to come’