EU Immigration Crisis Megathread

[Tamas]

True

[Syt]

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/19/world/europe/route-of-migrants-into-europe-shifts-toward-balkans.html?smid=fb-nytimes&smtyp=cur

Route of Migrants Into Europe Shifts Toward Balkans

BUDAPEST — The surge of migrants into Europe from war-ravaged and impoverished parts of the Middle East, Afghanistan and Africa has shifted in recent months. Migrants are now pushing by land across the western Balkans, in numbers roughly equal to those entering the Continent through Italy.

Much of Europe is reeling from the flow of people seeking safety, jobs and a better life — but who have strained resources, heightened ethnic and religious tensions, and rewired politics in individual nations and throughout the Continent.

The new pathway is also causing a sharp rise in anti-immigrant sentiment in the Balkans and neighboring central Europes, bolstering nationalist parties and inspiring protests in many countries.

The economic crisis in Greece, the main landing point in Europe for migrants heading into the Balkans, could further impede efforts to control the flow by reducing political focus and money dedicated to securing the nation's borders.

The shift in the migrant path became evident from January through June, when about 79,000 migrants crossed illegally into Greece from Turkey, according to Frontex, the European Union's border watchdog agency. Some remained in Greece, but most continued north across Macedonia and Serbia into Hungary, which saw 67,000 illegal arrivals.

During the same half-year, the sea route from Libya to Italy, long the most popular path, also had about 67,000 illegal crossings.

Last year, the 170,000 migrants who tried to take the Mediterranean route to Italy outnumbered those entering through the western Balkans by nearly four to one. More sea crossings occur in warmer months, border officials said, making it likely that the traffic figures on the two routes will diverge by winter.

Hungarian officials said that as of Thursday, more than 81,000 migrants had crossed into their country in 2015. "If it continues at this pace, we are on track to reach the 150,000 mark this year," said Peter Szijjarto, minister of foreign affairs and trade.

Migration officials said they were not sure exactly why the flow had shifted toward the Balkans. They speculate that reports of frequent drownings and harrowing boat crossings may have played a part. At the same time, European nations have made interdiction a more central policy, and Libya has become increasingly volatile and dangerous.

Syrians may also be gravitating to the land route through Greece because changes in visa laws in the Middle East have made it more difficult to pass through the region on the way to Libya and then Italy, said Ewa Moncure, a spokeswoman for Frontex. Iran, a country that had attracted many Afghan refugees, has also altered its visa rules, making it more difficult for refugees to remain there. And Bulgaria, the other European nation that migrants might cross by land into Europe, has also tightened its border controls.

"We hear the situation has changed in Bulgaria and Iran, making it more difficult to migrate there, and everyone knows Italy is full," said Timea Kovacs, who represents the Helsinki Committee for Human Rights in the Hungarian border city of Szeged. "But we don't know for sure."

Migrants interviewed in recent days on both sides of the Hungarian border said they had chosen the Balkans route because it was less expensive and had been recommended by smugglers they paid to get them to Europe. The prices they had paid to reach the Hungarian border varied, depending on what level of service they purchased and how much the smugglers thought they could squeeze out of them, from $1,000 to more than $4,000 per person.

Most traveled from Turkey into Greece, either across its short land border or by boat. And the bulk of those continued through Macedonia and Serbia before encountering the Hungarian border, the main obstacle on their path to Western Europe.

About 19,000 migrants from a mix of countries crossed into Hungary in 2013, but the figure jumped to more than 43,000 in 2014 because of a mass evacuation from Kosovo, Mr. Szijjarto, the foreign minister, said. A multinational agreement allowed Hungary to turn Kosovars back to Serbia, and by mid-February that human stream had evaporated. But it was more than replaced by a fresh wave of migrants from Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq, Eritrea, Somalia, and other Middle Eastern and African zones of war or turmoil.

Resistance to the migrants, many of whom are Muslim, has been growing in even the most liberal European nations, spawning advances by right-wing parties in Denmark, France and Britain.

But nowhere has it been exploited the way it has been in Hungary, where the conservative government of Viktor Orban, whose popularity is sagging, has seized on concerns about immigration.

"The government campaign has been really powerful in taking what had been a nonissue in Hungary and turning it into a very big issue," said Csaba Toth, director of strategy for the Republikon Institute, a political research group that has been critical of the government.

Government officials deny that anti-immigrant sentiment is rising in Hungary, or that they are attempting to stoke it.

"We have no bad experience with Muslims," Mr. Szijjarto said. "There is no xenophobia in this country either. But we are not in a position to host tens of thousands of migrants."

Right-wing groups have already staged protests in Budapest and elsewhere, and are promising to stage more outside government-run refugee camps and along the Serbian border.

For their part, the migrants say they want to pass through Hungary as quickly as possible on their way to Germany and other Western European countries that they have been told are more welcoming.

"Nobody wants to go to Hungary," said a man who identified himself only as Mirivan, 27, an English literature student from Damascus, Syria, who hopes to earn a master's degree somewhere in Western Europe. "No, sorry."

In May, the Hungarian government mailed what it called a "national consultation" to millions of Hungarian voters, asking them, among other things, whether they are concerned about a link between the migrants and terrorism, and whether government money now going to migrants should instead be spent on Hungarian families.

Zoltan Kovacs, Mr. Orban's international spokesman, said the early results showed a worried public.

"Over 80 percent favor tougher measures against the immigrants," Mr. Kovacs said. "Of course, it is not a scientific survey. It is a political questionnaire, to consult with the voters. But still, 60 percent say they feel there is a link between migrants and terrorism. Obviously, there is a serious risk. It is just logical."

The government also organized a nationwide billboard campaign of messages directed at the migrants — but written in Hungarian — warning them to abide by local laws, to respect Hungarian culture and not to try to take Hungarians' jobs.

Mr. Orban also said his government would follow the example of Bulgaria, which is building a fence along its border with Turkey, and construct a temporary 13-foot fence along the 108-mile Serbian border — an announcement that disappointed the Serbs, who are trying to join the European Union.

Construction was to begin last week on a test section, with hopes of completing the entire project by Nov. 30, the defense minister, Csaba Hende, said at a news conference in the border town of Morahalom.

Mr. Orban also said recently that the government intends to close its current refugee facilities in populated areas around the country — already criticized by migrant advocates as overcrowded and squalid — and transfer residents to new tented encampments in more remote areas.

In a move many advocates find ominous, Hungary has also passed legislation allowing it to turn away or deport migrants by declaring neighboring countries, such as Serbia, to be "safe."

"The government attitude is that they came through safe countries, so they should have stayed there," said Gabor Gyulai, refugee program coordinator for the Helsinki Committee for Human Rights in Budapest.

Hungary has always had a bit of a xenophobic streak, Mr. Gyulai said, though usually it is below the surface.

In an experiment in 2006, a Hungarian polling company asked what respondents thought about various ethnic groups, including an invented group, the "Pirez people." Two-thirds said they did not like the Pirez people one bit.

"Oh yes, everybody hates the Pirez," Gergely Kovacs, founder of a satirical political group in Budapest known as the Dog With Two Tails Party, said with a laugh.

Mr. Kovacs, a graphic designer, had been so upset with the billboard campaign that he appealed on the Internet for money to mount one of his own.

He raised $117,000, enough for 900 billboards, almost as many as the 1,000 erected by the government.

His billboards look very much like the blue and white official ones, but they have slogans like "We Apologize for Our Prime Minister."

The anti-immigrant sentiment in Central Europe may be frightening to the new arrivals, but it has yet to deter the flow of migrants.

Still, it worries Zoltan Bolek, president of the Hungarian Islamic Community, one of two associations that represent the 10,000 Muslim residents in a country of 10 million.

"Until now, there has been little Islamophobia in Hungary," he said. "So we are surprised at what is happening."

[Zanza]

I was way too optimistic when it came to the changed attitude in Germany that I described in this thread earlier. I guess it just took the Nazis some time to show up. 

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-33700624

Immigration fuels rising tension in Germany



[...] Germany receives more refugees than any other European county.
In the first half of this year, 180,000 people claimed asylum in Germany, and that number is expected to more than double by the end of 2015.
Towns and cities are converting gyms and warehouses into accommodation or putting refugees up in tent cities. Volunteers are rushing to donate clothes, money, time.
This year's influx is expected to cost up to 5bn euros (£3.5bn). And the strain is beginning to show.

Attacks rising

Attacks on accommodation for asylum seekers have increased significantly. According to the interior ministry, this year there have already been 173 attacks (175 were registered in the whole of last year ).
On Monday night, more than 2,000 people marched through Dresden in support of Pegida, a movement against what it calls the "Islamisation of the West", which attracts the far right as well as people who simply oppose immigration or fear its effects.
And, nearby, in the town of Freital, several hundred people held anti-refugee protests outside accommodation for asylum seekers.
The attacks and protests horrify most Germans. Many believe it is the duty of a rich country to help refugees.
Others view immigration as a potential solution to the country's ageing demographic and a shortage of skilled labour.
Above all, in a country where the past still stains the present, any manifestation of racist sentiment evokes profound concern.
Justice Minister Heiko Maas spoke for many when he condemned the protests, saying there was "no place for xenophobia in Germany".
The news magazine Spiegel pictured refugees on this week's front cover, accompanied by a headline: "Hatred of asylum seekers poisons Germany".

So, there is a febrile atmosphere as politicians squabble over how to deal with the issue.
The debate - which has been simmering for months - tends to revolve around two questions:

• Who should pay for the refugees flooding into Germany?
  Is there a way to reduce the numbers?

The federal government recently agreed to release 1m euros to help German states cope with the growing bill.

It was not enough, said the Bavarian prime minister this week.
Horst Seehofer, who leads the CSU (the sister party to Angela Merkel's conservatives), is also behind controversial plans to reduce the number of asylum seekers from Albania, Kosovo and Montenegro.
His party's proposal would extend a strategy the federal government executed last year.
In December, Berlin declared Serbia, Bosnia-Hercegovina and Macedonia "safe countries of origin", making it much easier (and faster) for the state to refuse asylum claimants from those countries.
In Bavaria, they are already planning separate - and controversial - camps for them.

The idea "worked" in that the number of asylum seekers from those countries has risen by 12%, while the numbers from Albania, Kosovo and Montenegro rose by 500%.
In fact, while this year 34,000 refugees have arrived from Syria, 31,000 came from Kosovo.
No wonder, perhaps, many politicians favour declaring it and the two other Balkan states "safe".
But gaining consensus on that proposal may be tricky.
There is plenty of opposition from those who believe it is morally wrong and impractical, and who worry such a plan is simply borne out of - and exacerbates - a right-wing anti-immigrant rhetoric.

Refugee politics

"Fluchtlingspolitik" (refugee politics) makes for uncomfortable debate in Germany.
And, arguably, the real solution does not lie within the power of a single country - however wealthy or attractive it is to refugees.
Last year, the German interior minister demanded other European countries took more responsibility for refugees.
The EU commission came up with an idea for a "quota" system under which countries would take in specific numbers of refugees according to their population size and gross domestic product (GDP).
Those countries still cannot agree on a plan. [...]

[Syt]

Zanza, if you're on facebook, check out "Hooligans gegen Satzbau." It's both funny and depressing.

[Valmy]

I was way too optimistic when it came to the changed attitude in Germany that I described in this thread earlier. I guess it just took the Nazis some time to show up. 

What exactly did you base this optimism on? Have we not seen ethnic conflict in Europe going on for centuries? Heck look at some of the countries in the EU, like Cyprus and the Baltic States.

[Crazy_Ivan80]

There's not many mass migrations that happened peacefully. Did anyone thing this time would be different? There's worse to come.

[Valmy]

There's not many mass migrations that happened peacefully. Did anyone thing this time would be different? There's worse to come.

Especially ones like this. These people are not going there because they see their futures in Europe, they would rather have stayed home. But they cannot, so they have to go to whomever will take them. Just bad news.

[The Brain]

There's not many mass migrations that happened peacefully. Did anyone thing this time would be different? There's worse to come.

Especially ones like this. These people are not going there because they see their futures in Europe, they would rather have stayed home.

Indeed. Many of them even go back to the old countries on holiday.

[Valmy]

Indeed. Many of them even go back to the old countries on holiday.

Wait these are refugees we are talking about. They are taking little pleasure trips to Syria?

[The Brain]

Indeed. Many of them even go back to the old countries on holiday.

Wait these are refugees we are talking about. They are taking little pleasure trips to Syria?

I don't know about Syria, but refugees in Sweden often make trips to the old country. Why wouldn't they? Remember that Sweden's definition of refugee is much broader than the term would suggest.

[Syt]

Meanwhile in Calais. The folks who run the Eurotunnel say they have caught 10s of thousands of attempts to get across the channel this year. Mostly refugees try to hide on trucks and trains. If refugees are caught on the UK side, the truck driver has to pay a fine unless he can prove he did whatever he could to keep stowaways off.

[The Brain]

Where's the wooden wall?

[garbon]

I can kinda understand the desire to be in the UK vs. France.

[Syt]

I can kinda understand the desire to be in the UK vs. France.

Well, it's not like the UK couldn't do more to share the burden, when you look at asylum seekers per capita.

[Duque de Bragança]

I can kinda understand the desire to be in the UK vs. France.

And the French would rather have these illegal migrants in the UK as well. Meanwhile, the French interior minister blames Eurotunnel for not doing enough to contain them.