Today
Europe faces a primal test. As leaders meet in Brussels to discuss the bodies floating in the
Mediterranean, they should look across
the table and ask themselves what being European means. The reason so many hurl
themselves recklessly at our rocky southern shores is because we are a haven of
civilisation, where peace and law prevail, human rights are mostly observed,
mercy is valued and murder punished.
Europe may lose that reputation if it becomes
primarily a fortress, ignoring the age-old humanitarian lore of the sea that
long predates human rights laws. But ahead of today’s meeting, the head of
Frontex, the EU border agency, said restoring search and rescue was not in his remit, or EU
policy. The commitment is to double
funding in 2015 and 2016, and “reinforce the assets” of the existing Operation
Triton and Operation Poseidon border surveillance, which only patrol within 30
miles of Italy’s coast.
Like all the big questions, there is no
satisfactory answer to what could become a mass movement of people out of the
war-torn, employment-deserts of Africa towards the Mediterranean, with dreams of
a new life in Europe. But the first
answer must be to keep hold of first principles. People cannot be deliberately
drowned because all of Europe’s decent political parties lack the moral spine to
face down their xenophobic fringes. Standing together in absolute refusal to let
people die has to be the starting point and the end point today.
First solution: stop the panic. So far numbers
are not massive – 150,000 made it to Italy last year (3,500 dead on the way) –
numbers easily absorbed within the EU’s 28 nations. Second rule: don’t lie about
what can be done. David Cameron learned to his cost about over-promising on
immigration. The idea, in the draft summit statement, that just 5,000 selected
refugees can be screened and dispersed while the rest are sent back is fantasy.
Without papers, it’s often unclear where people come from, countries won’t take
them and the cost of locking them up and then putting them on planes with four
security guards each is prohibitive.
By all means try everything being proposed.
Former SBS man Paddy Ashdown wants to send in the gunboats to destroy Libyan
traffickers’ boats. But that act of war needs UN approval, and will he blow up
every fishing smack along the African coast? Patrolling did deter Somali
pirates, but there is no law that prevents large numbers of law-abiding people
being in boats at sea – that’s not piracy.
Thursday 23 April 2015 11.18 BST
Today Europe faces a primal test. As leaders meet in Brussels to discuss the bodies floating in the Mediterranean, they should look across the table and ask themselves what being European means. The reason so many hurl themselves recklessly at our rocky southern shores is because we are a haven of civilisation, where peace and law prevail, human rights are mostly observed, mercy is valued and murder punished.
Europe may lose that reputation if it becomes primarily a fortress, ignoring the age-old humanitarian lore of the sea that long predates human rights laws. But ahead of today’s meeting, the head of Frontex, the EU border agency, said restoring search and rescue was not in his remit, or EU policy. The commitment is to double funding in 2015 and 2016, and “reinforce the assets” of the existing Operation Triton and Operation Poseidon border surveillance, which only patrol within 30 miles of Italy’s coast.
Like all the big questions, there is no satisfactory answer to what could become a mass movement of people out of the war-torn, employment-deserts of Africa towards the Mediterranean, with dreams of a new life in Europe. But the first answer must be to keep hold of first principles. People cannot be deliberately drowned because all of Europe’s decent political parties lack the moral spine to face down their xenophobic fringes. Standing together in absolute refusal to let people die has to be the starting point and the end point today.
First solution: stop the panic. So far numbers are not massive – 150,000 made it to Italy last year (3,500 dead on the way) – numbers easily absorbed within the EU’s 28 nations. Second rule: don’t lie about what can be done. David Cameron learned to his cost about over-promising on immigration. The idea, in the draft summit statement, that just 5,000 selected refugees can be screened and dispersed while the rest are sent back is fantasy. Without papers, it’s often unclear where people come from, countries won’t take them and the cost of locking them up and then putting them on planes with four security guards each is prohibitive.
By all means try everything being proposed. Former SBS man Paddy Ashdown wants to send in the gunboats to destroy Libyan traffickers’ boats. But that act of war needs UN approval, and will he blow up every fishing smack along the African coast? Patrolling did deter Somali pirates, but there is no law that prevents large numbers of law-abiding people being in boats at sea – that’s not piracy.