For Gérald Darmanin, the immigration issue has never seemed so burning. Within the borders, Élisabeth Borne put pressure on him: he must find a majority in Parliament with a view to presenting the immigration law. His trip to Rome on Monday did not allow him to get away from it all. The Minister of the Interior raised the same subject, this time abroad, in the presence of his Italian counterpart. His message? Show “firmness” with regard to the massive arrival of migrants in the transalpine region.
Between last Monday and Wednesday, around 8,500 migrants spread across 199 boats reached the small island of Lampedusa, the gateway for years for candidates for exile. “There cannot be a message given to people who come to our (European) soil that they will be welcomed whatever happens,” commented the minister.
A security response that “validates” the Italian strategy
In France, the response to the flow of recent days is first and foremost security. While rumors of the establishment of migrant camps grew, before being denied by the Alpes-Maritimes prefecture, Paris is seeking to free up a “space” of one hundred additional detention places on the Franco-Italian border. “A municipal plot could be made available to state services and civil protection,” also commented the mayor of Menton Yves Juhel, in a press release. The police presence around the border is sustained.
“The response that France gives allows us to give a blank check to Italian President Giorgia Meloni,” laments Delphine Rouilleault, general director of France Terre d’Asile. This validates its strategy of hardening and securing borders. We are disappointed that France is not playing the solidarity game but aware that Italy did not ask for it. »
European solidarity to rethink
The voluntary solidarity mechanism, adopted in 2022, should allow an EU state faced with a significant influx of migrants to distribute arrivals in solidarity to other countries which have volunteered. “But there is no compulsory solidarity,” laments Delphine Rouilleault. “Beyond the law, a policy of bargaining is underway between States to distribute migrants. It is a political balance of power between Nation-States with a cynical question: ‘How to get rid of populations considered embarrassing,’ comments Smaïn Laacher, director of the migratory observatory at the Jean-Jaurès foundation and professor emeritus of sociology at the University of Strasbourg.
In principle, according to the Dublin agreements, Italy is supposed to take care of asylum seekers who enter the European Union through its soil. “But the country is not playing the game and is putting all its energy into closing the borders,” explains Delphine Rouilleault. Result: after the signing of a “strategic partnership” between the EU and Tunisia this summer to contain the arrival of migrants, the President of the European Commission Ursula Van der Leyen drew up a ten-point emergency plan aimed at in particular to increase the returns of arrivals to their country of origin.
A “spectacular” influx of migrants in Lampedusa but not unprecedented
“If countries that are more open and more likely to welcome a dignified welcome like France and Germany do not make themselves heard to demand a change in the rules, we fear that the EU will engage in an ever greater radicalization of its positions, with militarization and closed camps at the EU borders,” indicates the general director of France Terre d’Asile.
Especially since for Smaïn Laacher, the current situation with this influx of migrants on the small Italian island is not “exceptional”. “This number of migrants arriving at once in Lampedusa is spectacular, it’s true, but not unprecedented. This puts those who have the duty to take care of these populations into political disarray, but they have been arriving from the Maghreb for a long time,” recalls Smaïn Larcher. “The trend is towards an increase, but it is perfectly absorbable given the size and wealth of the European Union,” concludes Delphine Rouilleault.
Certainly, Rome has welcomed 130,000 migrants since January, twice as many as last year over the same period. But out of the million asylum requests registered in 2022 in the EU, Italy had only received 84,000 requests, which places the country far from the leader in effective reception. As AFP points out, for comparison, last year France received twice as many requests as its transalpine neighbor.