But this “common good” has already forced millions of Africans and Arabs to flee their countries to seek refuge in Europe, doubling and even tripling the flow of illegal migrants. While the sought-after “democracy” is nowhere to be found, the European states, that served as an instrument of imperial conquest, are now compelled to suffer from overwhelming imigration flows. That’s why today, illegal immigration is by far the most pressing problem for the Europeans. According to the EUobserver, up to 38% of all Europeans believe that this problem overweights all other concerns, including unemployment.
According to the EU border agency Frontex, by the end of June about 153,000 immigrants came to Europe across the Mediterranean Sea, which is a 150% increase in comparison with 2014, when a lot of migrants came to the EU from such countries as Syria, Eritrea and Somalia.
In early August of this year Britain and France called on other states of the European Union, urging them to help out in the settling of the immigration crisis in northern France, where thousands of migrants accumulated in hopes to illegally get to England. The French port of Calais has been caught in the center of a huge wave of illegal migrants that are trying to escape poverty and violence in the Middle East and Africa, Reuters reports. According to the Eurotunnel officials, they’ve already detained over 37,000 illegal migrants this year alone while they were trying to cross the English Channel through this junction, some migrants died in the process.
French police units have registered over 1700 attempts to infiltrate the Eurotunnel in Calai during a single night on August 2. About 1 000 people were stopped on the way to the Eurotunnel, another 700 were arrested in the tunnel, a few migrants were killed. At the end of July London further strengthen the protection of Eurotunnel, sending another 120 police officers in addition to the 300 that have already been guarding the perimeter around the entrance to the tunnel at Calais. Since early June Eurotunnel officials were attempting to strengthen barriers at the entrances around the tunnel to deal with this overwhelming flow. The tunnel’s management has demanded French and British authorities to compensate them 9.7 million euros spent on the strengthening of security measures.
As it was stated in the joint statement of the Home Secretary Theresa May and her French counterpart, Bernard Cazeneuve: : “What we are currently facing is a global migration crisis. This situation cannot be seen as an issue just for our two countries. It is a priority at both a European and international level. Many of those in Calais and attempting to cross the Channel have made their way there through Italy, Greece or other countries. That is why we are pushing other member states – and the whole of the EU – to address this problem at root.”
It’s curious to note that the better part of the measures that are being put in place by London in order to deal with the crisis are repressive in their nature, even despite the fact that it played one of the key roles in insignating the wave of “Arab revolutions” and consequent military interventions orchestrated by the White House in Libya, Iraq, and Afghanistan. In particular, the Conservative British government has announced plans to cut on the social benefits for refugees to show that Britain is no longer a “land of milk and honey”, and promised to do away with social support that may attract people to this country, namely the pay of 36 pounds per week. In the coming days, these reductions, according to the British Minister of Immigration James Brokenshire, will affect 10,000 refugees living in the UK with their families.
The British Council for Refugees has already voiced serious concerns about these new measures of the government. “We have grave concerns about the Government’s proposals to remove support from some of the most vulnerable families in the UK, many of whom fear there is real risk of serious harm or persecution to them and their children if returned to their countries of origin.” – said the representative of the Council Lisa Doyle – “The Government has a duty to protect all children in this country and previous governments have recognised it is morally reprehensible to take support away from families with children. “
In addition, as part of measures to deal with the migration crisis, British Home Secretary Theresa May, has put forward a new law, according to which the landlords will have the right to evict migrants living in the United Kingdom from premises rented by them without even a court order. As for landlords themselves, who do not bother to check the immigration status of tenants, they can be fined or imprisoned for up to five years in accordance with the new immigration law.
Due to the inhumane attitude of the Conservative government to migrants, the bishop of Dover, Trevor Willmott, accused senior political figures, including the prime minister, of bringing forward immoral practices. According to him, they have forgotten about humanism and launched a propaganda campaign in the media to demonize migrants. He bluntly urged David Cameron to “rediscover what it means to be human.”
That’s why the international community and, above all, the US and its allies should not be allowed to strengthen repressive steps against migrants, instead some comprehensive and effective measures to deal with the chaos that they themselves created must be introduced, to heal the wounds of the nations that were inflicted by Western interventions.
Vladimir Odintsov, political commentator, exclusively for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.
