The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Filippo Grandi, called, on Wednesday 10 November, for the EU to stop the “race to the bottom” in the reception of asylum seekers, judging the European policy in this area “mixed” and expressing concern about “the practices of some Member States”.
The Italian was speaking to MEPs during a debate on the 70th anniversary of the Geneva Refugee Convention. A debate strongly influenced by the current situation in Poland and on the border with Belarus.
In this regard, the High Commissioner recalled that the policy of flight to safety supported by the Minsk regime was unacceptable and aggravated the situation of already vulnerable people. The UN is calling for “urgent action” to allow humanitarian personnel access to these areas, he said.
But this news also allowed the Italian to warn Europeans against “impulsive” actions. “These challenges simply do not justify the knee-jerk reaction we have seen in some places” such as “the walls and barbed wire, the violent pushbacks”, the High Commissioner referring more broadly to cases of migrants both beaten or even thrown into the water and left without help, and denouncing “all attempts to circumvent the right to asylum”.
“The EU can do better on asylum and the Rule of law”, he said, also acknowledging that irregular migration and people arriving without being entitled to protection can be a challenge to public confidence in asylum systems. Here, not only the UN but also the IOM can help the Member States, he insisted.
More broadly, the Italian called on Member States to strengthen their offers of refugee resettlement - at a time when the world has had more than 80 million people internally displaced by conflict or other crises in 2020, and when crises are currently worsening, as in Ethiopia - but also to make it easier for people to stay in their countries of origin through peace-building capacities or financial aid.
His speech was supported by the S&D, Greens/EFA and Renew Europe groups, some of whose representatives deplored the creation of a ‘Fortress Europe’. “Erecting walls is preventing the right to asylum”, said the Italian MEP, Simona Bonafé (S&D).
For the Dutch MEP, Jeroen Lenaers (EPP), each Member State “must make its contribution to the Global Compact on Refugees” (signed at the end of 2019), but the EU has also taken in more than five million refugees over the past five years and hundreds of thousands of asylum applications are open. “We must also recognise that there are people who are not refugees and who exploit asylum mechanisms”, he said, calling for a better distinction between people in need of international protection and those who are not. (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)