EU writes the practices of massacre into law
Featured image: Asylum seekers in a “detention center” in Greece. Source: euromedmonitor.org
On Wednesday the 10th of April the European Union approved a new asylum and migration pact, after eight years in the making. The core of the pact is to bring the migrants to “custody-like” conditions to camps where they will be registered. Asylum applications should be processed in 12 weeks, and within this same period, rejected asylum seekers should be deported to their country of origin or a third country from which they entered the EU. Migrants will be subjected to pre-entry procedures such as identification and health-checks. Biometric data of all migrants older than six years will be collected. According to the pact, asylum claims with “low changes of being accepted” can be processed faster and without the applicant coming into EU-territory, that means, sending them to a non-EU country. Additionally, there will be a “mechanism to react to sudden increases in arrivals”. In addition, EU-member States will have to support each other in dealing with migrants.
This pact means making the existing practices of treating migrants like non-humans into law, and is another step to fortify the “fortress Europe”. It is writing into law the existing practices of murderous “push-backs” and massacres. Since 2014, 63,000 migrants have been documented to have died world-wide while fleeing poverty and conflict, and this number is only a fraction of the truth as there are many whose death is not documented. 60% of the deaths documented are related to drowning, and in the last decade, 28,000 people have been documented to have drowned in the Mediterranean sea while trying to reach Europe. 2023 was the deadliest year since 2014. On the same day the law was approved, two boats capsized near Lampedusa, Italy, with dozens missing and most likely dead. And on Friday, bodies of four women were found in a boat in Cartagena, Spanish State. Migrants die on their way to Europe almost daily.
This is a massacre: the imperialists of Europe and their lackeys systematically carry out policies that murder – the imperialists have created conditions that force large masses of people to flee their homes, they are the ones who have created conditions for human traffickers to use the desperate situation of these people, they are the ones who actively push people to drown in the Mediterranean. In addition to these “covered-up” crimes they also commit blatant mass murder like the one in Melilla or carry out torture, rape, forced labor and enforced disappearance such as has been reported to have been done by the coastal guard of Libya which receives EU-support to carry out “interceptions” of migrant boats. Now this law will further legitimize and enforce these practices.
This pact violates the own ideals of “human rights” and the international laws of the bourgeoisie, which grant everyone the right to seek asylum. It means openly treating asylum seekers, even children, like criminals, with imposing “custody-like” conditions on them, that is, depriving them of liberty which is a violation of “human rights”. This further authorizes the border control and police to conduct more violence against the migrants. In practice, this illegal incarceration has long been happening, for example on the islands of Greece, where asylum seekers have been locked up in inhumane conditions and treated like prisoners in EU-funded camps. The law-makers claim the pact is only directed against those whose claim to asylum is not “legitimate” – however, these criteria is completely based on arbitrary definitions of “safe” countries and the pact is legitimizing the practices that have been commonly applied to all asylum seekers.
It is in the interest of the European imperialists to impose this type of control. They need migration, they need workers who have less rights than the workers of imperialist countries, but at the same time, they need to stay in control of the migration movement. The amount of migrants have grown in the world due to the increasing imperialist exploitation and oppression, and all of these people of the oppressed nations coming into Europe would seriously shake the stability of the imperialist countries of Europe. It would inflame many contradictions within them, and also “bring the war home”. In addition, the pact works to inflame chauvinism against migrants of the oppressed nations, with painting pictures of a threat, a horde, that needs to be stopped with any means necessary. Fortifying the borders against an external “enemy” also works as a tool to increase militarization and impose false unity within the European societies.
Of course, enforcing these policies will not stop the migrants. It will, as said, lead to more massacres and on the other hand create even more desperate conditions to the migrants, making them even more vulnerable to ending up to be exploited even in slavery-like conditions.
EU-Commissioner Ylva Johansson said that all EU-member States have to implement the pact or face legal action. Some countries, especially the oppressed nations such as Poland, have expressed their discontent especially with the asylum seeker relocation mechanism and the so-called “mandatory solidarity”. But many imperialists, with German imperialism in the front line, have expressed being very satisfied and called the pact historical and a great success. The main groups supporting the pact were the EPP (“European People’s Party”), the S&D (“Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats”) and Renew Europe. These groups include “christian-democratic” Parties, social-democratic Parties and “liberal” Parties. Some of these parties said they see the pact as a successful tool to address immigration questions and thus “combat the far-right” ahead of the EU-elections. Many NGOs have criticized the pact for violating “human rights”. The proceedings in the European Parliament were also interrupted by protesters shouting “This law kills! Vote no!” and throwing paper planes with coordinates of deadly migrant shipwrecks.
This new EU-pact is a gross violation of the so-called “universal” values of “human rights” of the bourgeoisie and their own international laws. It is legitimizing the policy of massacres in the face of increasing migration movement, which is caused by the imperialists themselves, and inflaming chauvinism against the people of the oppressed nations.
