https://arab.news/6af7x
Europeans may be horrified by the new US administration’s draconian immigration policies, which include snatching people off the streets and deporting them without due process. But the EU’s decade-long crackdown on irregular African migration — targeting people who are fleeing conflict, climate disasters and poverty attempting to reach Europe by sea in flimsy boats — is equally appalling. Worse, the European Commission is seeking to double down on this approach: a leaked proposal for the next long-term budget cycle calls for conditioning development aid for African countries on meeting migration-reduction targets.
Africans comprise a fairly large share of the EU’s irregular migrants, with West and Central African countries accounting for about one-third of those arriving in the first half of 2024. At least 11 million African-born migrants reside in Europe — more than double the number living in Asia and North America — where they boost the labor force and ease the economic pressures caused by a rapidly aging local population.
But many Europeans treat migrants who arrive in small boats as a security threat, criminalizing their entry and scapegoating them for broader societal problems. After millions of Syrian, Afghan and Iraqi refugees fled to the bloc in 2015-16, the EU began strengthening “Fortress Europe.” Some countries, including Greece, Hungary, Poland and Slovenia, built external border fences, while others, like Germany and the Netherlands, have reintroduced border controls.
