Illegal immigration is the issue that disconcerts Europe most at present. UK Prime Minister Tony Blair says that it and the related issue of asylum (now the standard means of seeking entry by illegal immigrants) are the most urgent problems facing Europe. The Spanish, Dutch, German, Austrian, Italian and Danish governments are of the same view. So it will be at the top of today’s agenda at the EU heads of state and government summit in Seville. The aim is to hammer out an effective common policy on illegal immigration.
No one can criticize the Europeans for taking at last the issue seriously. The number of illegal immigrants in the EU has risen to at least 3 million, and is growing fast: the rate of entry is now half-a- million every year. Some countries feel swamped, particularly smaller ones like Austria and the Netherlands, where foreigners make up 9 percent of the population. Larger ones too are beginning to worry about the political implications of such numbers. Germany has possibly as many as a million illegal immigrants; Italy sees 400,000 of them pouring across its borders every year. In southern Spain, every week the authorities have to bury the corpses, washed up on their beaches, of unknown Moroccans and Africans who perished trying to swim the few kilometers to what they believed was a good life ahead in Europe — 3,000drowned in the past five years.
Many asylum seekers are economic migrants, pure and simple. Even within those who are beyond doubt asylum seekers, there is an element of economic fortune hunting. No country can encourage that. The people in Kingdom would take a dim view if the authorities here allowed overstayers to remain, with all the social and medical benefits available to them and able to undercut Saudis in the jobs market. It is no different with other countries. In the Far East, countries like Malaysia regularly deport illegal immigrants by the thousands. No one there has a problem with that; political correctness does not enter the issue. In the West, however, immigration has become bound up with racism. The two need to be separated, not least because if they are not, the far right will hold on to immigration and use it, as they did in the recent French and Dutch elections, to win votes. It was the success of the far right in those elections that woke up men like Tony Blair and Spanish Prime Minister Jose-Maria Aznar to the need to reclaim the issue for the center ground.
However, there remains a real possibility that what transpires today at Madrid will be yet another example of Euro-fudge, which means that Europe will achieve nothing. Spain, currently holding the European presidency, has proposed a raft of ideas, one of which is EU sanctions against any country uncooperative in accepting back illegal immigrants. Germany, the UK, Denmark and Italy agree. France and Sweden are opposed. There are other ideas, notably standardizing the welfare provided to refugees, and giving help to countries of first entry to improve border controls. It is unrealistic and unfair to expect those on the front line of illegal immigration — Greece, Italy and Spain — to carry the burden for everyone else. All these make sense. And there is nothing inherently racist in Europe saying, “No, we can’t take any more.”
