Brussels, 30 nov – The New Pact on Migration and Asylum, tabled by the European Commission is still blocked and there’s still long to go to see finally approved.
A long list of amendments proposed will take time to be discussed despite the urgency of quick and effective intervention on ongoing migrants crises at EU borders where innocent people, escaping war torn countries, are dangerously instrumentalised as at the Polish border with Belarus, or are victims of smugglers as we are seeing in Channel crossing.
While migrants are causing international tensions and give way to far-right dangerous nationalist movements to build propaganda on migration, the EU take its time…
“We have extended a wide amending period to take into consideration amendments which are to be tabled by the political groups so we can come up with compromises“, said the Spanish Juan Fernando López Aguilar MP for S&D group and Rapporteur for the Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs (LIBE).
“We regret that the Commission proposal (Asylum Procedures Regulation proposal 2016) is still blocked from five years despite the hard work the EU Parliament has put into it” explaining that happened “because there have been no fruitful outcomes of the trilogue procedures and there has been no actual common position by the Council so has blocked for too long any progress in the updating and the enhancement of the system”.
VIDEO – Fernando López Aguilar MP S&D and Rapporteur for Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs (LIBE).
Presenting to the press LIBE amendments López Aguilar highlighted the points of concern of the new Pact are more than one, firstly the return sponsorship which gives the chance to member states to refuse migrants and relocate them to other EU countries or return them altogether to their countries of origin.
“Return sponsorship: it has never been clear how it would be workable – said López Aguilar – It’s not clear how sponsoring a return may be actually working. Is that direct sponsoring member state to member state or via the Commission or through certain allocation funds. Of course we are ready to discuss through the amending procedures and compromises”
Among the main LIBE amendments the institution of an EU relocation coordinator meant to help the member state in trouble facing mass influx.
“Solidarity must be a pillar of the common EU asylum system because that’s precisely the mandate of article 80 of the Treaty of Functioning of the EU binding solidarity and shared responsibility” he said. But there’s a bulk of countries ‘solidarity’ is not the main value for when it comes to migration and it will take a long time and huge efforts to find compromises.
Talkeurope.org 