Immigration – time to see if moderates or extremists are running the show

Date: 20/06/02

Described by Romano Prodi as 'the burning issue', immigration looks set to dominate the Seville summit this weekend. David Cronin reports.

BEFORE they unveil their much-anticipated blueprint on tackling immigration this weekend, EU leaders could do worse than talk to a group which has been protesting in Seville recently.

Hundreds of North Africans, who normally come over for summer jobs picking strawberries in neighbouring Huelva, have staged a demonstration in the city's university. They are angry that eastern Europeans are taking work previously 'reserved' for them.

True, this is far from the worst example of the hardship which immigrants endure. But it does illustrate that immigration is a multi-faceted phenomenon. Presenting both problems and opportunities, it is not something which can easily be regulated by a 'compromise' declaration cobbled together at an EU summit.

European Commission chief Romano Prodi has described immigration as the 'burning issue' for Seville. He has made it clear that the political elite cannot play deaf to the alarm bells set off by the considerable votes amassed in the past few months by Jean-Marie Le Pen in France and followers of the murdered Pim Fortuyn in the Netherlands.

It is precisely because the far-right successfully exploited widely held fears about immigrants and asylum-seekers that the question has been catapulted to the top of the summit's agenda. Pro-refugee groups, though, have long argued that laws should not be built around fears. They should instead be based on a sober analysis of reality.

For instance, they show that the number of foreigners arriving in France is declining. According to figures compiled by the UN High Commission on Refugees, 12,629 applied for asylum during the first three months of this year, compared to 12,816 during the last three months of 2001. The decrease is minuscule - only 1.5 - but it nonetheless puts paid to any notion that migration to the land of equality and liberty is soaring.

The statistics also show that just four EU countries - Austria, Finland, Portugal and Britain - have witnessed increases in asylum applications over the past few months. Across the 15 member states, 87,000 sought refugee status in January-March 2002, compared to almost 94,000 in October-December 2001. That constitutes a fall of more than 7.

Some politicians from both ends of the political spectrum have called for the debate about immigration to be conducted in measured tones.

Former Belgian premier Wilfried Martens claimed last weekend there has been 'a degree of hysterical nonsense' talked about the subject, especially since the 11 September attacks. 'We need to keep a sense of proportion. Immigration figures are in general much lower than in the early to mid-1990s. As far as EU enlargement is concerned, nothing in the EU's experience suggests a huge movement of population from new member states,' said the president of the European People's Party group.

Probably the most controversial idea floated in the pre-Seville debate was the UK's call for aid to poor countries to be made conditional on their cooperation with efforts to curb migratory flows. The Spanish presidency has backed the call but it has been vociferously opposed by Sweden and is expected to get short shrift from several other countries. Initially, the European Commission's development spokesman Michael Curtis poured cold water on the suggestion.

Yet Romano Prodi subsequently told MEPs he would be in favour of using aid as an 'instrument' to address 'the causes of migration'.

The proposal has also been attacked from within Britain's ruling Labour Party. MEP Claude Moraes, ex-director of the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants, believes it could be impractical: 'Plans to link aid to developing countries' willingness to accept deported illegal immigrants back may be thwarted by the fact that for many countries the foreign currency sent home by immigrants outweighs the amount received in aid,' he said. 'With receipts coming back often 20 times as much as the EU aid, it may prove difficult to enforce and countries may not cooperate.'

A somewhat more palatable suggestion - more likely to win the backing of summiteers - is that the Union should redouble efforts to negotiate readmission agreements with the wider world. To date it has accords on taking back migrants only with Hong Kong, Macao and Sri Lanka, although talks are under way on the possibility of securing further agreements with Morocco and Russia.

Arguably the most concrete plan tabled by the Commission on immigration recently was that a joint border guard should be set up to make the Union's external frontiers as secure as possible. To the federalist-minded, there is a strong sense of logic in this notion: it is in keeping with Helmut Kohl's grandiose vision of a common army and police force as the pot of gold lying at the end of the European integration rainbow.

However, the Scandinavian states are strongly sceptical about the idea, believing that protecting their borders is a matter of national sovereignty. It is difficult, then, to envisage anything other than platitudes emerging from Seville. Unless there is an unexpected meeting of minds, it seems the most that will be agreed is that EU leaders will reaffirm their commitment to the so-called Tampere goal of 'harmonising' their policies on asylum and migration.

There is also a slim possibility that some deal could be secured on closer liaison between national police forces and other relevant authorities. The work on migration issues which has been undertaken since the 1999 Tampere summit has so far yielded few tangible results.

On a most basic level, EU governments have still not been able to even agree a mutually acceptable definition of what criteria somebody should fulfil to have an asylum claim assessed. This ought not to be too arduous a task as the EU theoretically supports international refugee law such as the Geneva Convention, which lays down a list of criteria. Human rights groups believe, meanwhile, that people fleeing countries embroiled in internal conflict or where serious repression occurs have a strong case for protection.

Of the top ten countries of origins for asylum seekers in the EU during the past decade, several unmistakably fall within that category. These include Afghanistan, Sri Lanka and Turkey. Despite that fact, right-leaning politicians have made electoral gains by branding most asylum-seekers 'bogus'. Seville will show who's really setting the agenda: extremists or moderates.

Major feature previewing the European Council, Seville, 21-22 June 2002.