MEPs expect the European Council to make progress on reforming the European asylum system and, generally, on the issue of migration to the EU. That is the message they sent on Wednesday 4 October, in a debate on preparation of the European summit on 19-20 October. The debate was attended by European Commission First Vice-President Frans Timmermans and Estonian Foreign Minister Matti Maasikas.
Migration will be the first item on the agenda for the forthcoming Council, which will also discuss digitalisation, defence and, in Article 50 format, Brexit negotiations.
In the view of Gianni Pittella (Italy), the leader of the S&D Group, the European Council will have to address the root causes of migration and the reasons why people want to come to Europe.
Urging heads of state and/or government to reform the Dublin system, a revision of which always becomes unstuck over the balance to be found between solidarity and responsibility and also having compulsorily to take in asylum seekers who are being relocated. Pittella also called on leaders not to get the treatment wrong and not to turn Europe into a fortress. He warned them against new borders, including internal borders, put in place to tackle terrorism. “Cancer isn’t treated with aspirin, which causes ulcers”, he commented, alluding to the recent Commission proposal that would allow border controls within the Schengen area to be reinstated for reasons of internal security for up to three years.
He seized the opportunity also to call on the member states finally to allow Romania and Bulgaria to join the Schengen area. The European Commission also made this call on 27 September.
For the ALDE Group of which he is the leader, Guy Verhofstadt (Belgium) also stated that he expected two things of this summit: progress on migration and on reform of the EU. On migration, he expects European leaders to provide guidance to take forward the raft of proposals.
“We can criticise Dublin, the lack of a common system, the lack of means of legal migration, the poor management of the flows but the proposals that are needed are there”, he said. “We need a European Council that provides impetus” and he hopes that it will similarly energise the debate on the future of the EU.
The leader of the EPP Group, Manfred Weber (Germany), also stressed the “fundamental” right to asylum, which must, however, be for people who genuinely need protection. The ECR Group expressed another wish: that the European Council go back working through consensus on migration policy and stop following the will of the strongest – that is, a group of countries which imposes its decisions on the others, a way of doing things that has shown itself to be ineffective and that was, in part, responsible for the fall in support for Angela Merkel in the recent general election, commented Ryszard Antoni Legutko (Poland). (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)