EU commissioner for justice Didier Reynders on Tuesday (13 April) announced that a pilot project for EU-wide vaccine certificates could be launched “in the beginning of June” – aiming to have the whole system operating by the end of June.

But both MEPs and member states still have to give green light to the proposal.

All EU-approved vaccines will be accepted for the document. Individual member states can decide to accept other vaccines, such as the Russian or Chinese ones (Photo: European Commission)

Only 13 member states have agreed on the specific criteria for issuing such a green passport for tourism by this June “at the latest,” according to an announcement by the Austrian tourism ministry on Monday.

These are Austria, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Malta, Portugal, Slovenia, and Spain.

Member states will be able to extend the use of these certificates beyond tourism.

For their part, most MEPs have been vocal in support for the proposal put forward by the EU Commission, but key questions remain – ranging from fundamental rights to scientific validity.

The so-called Digital Green Certificate will provide proof of COVID-19 vaccination, recovery, or test results (both PCR test or rapid antigen test), with a QR code to ensure security. It will be free and available in digital form or on paper.

The EU Commission insists that this tool will prevent discrimination against individuals who are not vaccinated, but some MEPs remain skeptical about how the certificates will work in practice.

Under the commission proposal, EU countries have to issue vaccination certificates for people who have received any of the jabs approved by the European Medicine Agency. They can decide to accept other vaccines that have only been approved in a specific member state.

So far, BioNTech/Pfizer, Moderna, AstraZeneca, and Johnson&Johnson vaccines are the only jabs approved in the EU.

But Hungary, for example, has also approved the Russian Sputnik V vaccine and the Chinese Sinopharm jab.

As a result, EU citizens vaccinated with non-EMA-approved jabs might find more obstacles to travel within the bloc than Chinese and Russian tourists, Liberal MEP Yana Toom warned.

Affordable, or free, tests?

While the EU executive has repeatedly stressed that these certificates cannot be used as “a pre-condition to free movement” in the EU, fellow liberal MEP Sophie in ‘t Veld warned that they will be in practice.

“If you cannot show a certificate then you will be stopped at the border. It is that simple, so let’s be honest about it,” she added, pointing out that tests need to be affordable in all member states to be a true alternative for vaccination.

This idea is also supported by Green MEPs, who announced an amendment to the commission’s proposal, stressing that testing should be free for all.

In the EU, average costs differ significantly among member states.

In the Netherlands or Ireland, for example, the price of a travel-related PCR is between €100 to €160, while in Belgium it is about €50.

Yet, commissioner Reynders said that “making these test free of charge or capping their price would constitute a serious interference of member states competence in the field of public health”.

Meanwhile, the fact that the measure will be suspended only once the World Health Organization declares the end of the Covid-19 pandemic has also triggered doubts among EU lawmakers.

According to MEP Nicola Procaccini, from the European Conservatives and Reformists group, “a European instrument should not be in the hands of a non-EU organization”.

False expectations?

Another concern looms: the ‘recovery’ part of the certificate.

The European Data Protection Supervisor, Wojciech Wiewiórowski, said that there is little scientific evidence that the recovery from the disease grants any kind of immunity.

“Even if from a data protection point of view system is safe, its operation should not lead to the creation of false expectations,” he said.

“We cannot spread fake safety assurances which are not founded on solid scientifically proven knowledge,” he added.

The certificate proposal will not require any centralized database at the EU level.

The EU parliament aims at adopting its mandate for starting negotiations with the EU Council in the next plenary session (26-29 April).

Source: https://euobserver.com/coronavirus/151529

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At the beginning of the coronavirus crisis, it seemed as if Germany was coping better than the United Kingdom, the United States, and many other countries. In recent months, the exact opposite has been the case: the United States and the UK have two of the world’s most successful vaccination campaigns while Germany lags far behind. The deeper reason for Germany’s failings is its dysfunctional relationship with everything “national.”

Even the word “nation” is frowned upon by many members of Germany’s political class, intellectuals, and media outlets. Anyone who insists that the government should put the interests of their own people first—for example in the procurement of vaccines—is immediately branded a “nationalist.” Angela Merkel’s government was very clear that it delegated vaccine procurement to the EU because of the almost paranoid fear of being labeled a “vaccine nationalist.” Governments in the UK and United States have no such fear.

The result: although one of the first coronavirus vaccines was developed by the German company BioNTech and funded with hundreds of millions of euros by German taxpayers, there is now less vaccine available in Germany than in many other countries.

The problems Germany faced during the refugee crisis of 2015–2016 had the same cause. Here, too, Merkel’s government’s actions (or failures to act) were strongly determined by its disturbed relationship with the nation. This went so far that Angela Merkel publicly declared that she could not even protect the borders of her own country.

The fight against organized crime, too, has frequently failed because of the paranoid fear that anyone who takes a tough line could be branded “xenophobic” and, thus, a “nationalist.” As a result, the crimes committed by large Arab clans, who seem to dominate organized crime in many German cities, were largely hushed up for many years. This has only changed more recently—but decades have been lost in the fight against organized crime and that is why Germany is struggling to get to grips with the problem today.

German Megalomania

At the same time, this German complex is linked to a distinctly German megalomania, an almost grandiose hubris. This is evident in the fight against climate change. Although Germany is responsible for only 2 percent of global CO2 emissions, you could be forgiven for thinking that what Germany does will determine the fate of the entire planet. Many German politicians explicitly declare that Germany should be the role model for all other countries on the globe.

This all has echoes of the old slogan “Am deutschen Wesen mag die Welt genesen,” which means “By German values shall the world be healed.” This phrase was originally coined in a poem, Deutschlands Beruf, by Emanuel Geibel in 1861. The slogan “am deutschen Wesen soll die Welt genesen” was later employed by Germany’s political leaders, including Kaiser Wilhelm II.

The German claim to be a role model for the whole world in energy policy is all the more ridiculous because, from an outside perspective, Germany has adopted the “world’s dumbest energy policy.”

Germany is proud of its program to decommission both nuclear and coal-fired power plants, even though nuclear energy is one of the most climate-friendly energy sources and many renowned scientists are convinced that climate change cannot be solved without more nuclear power plants. As a result of irrational energy policies, electricity prices in Germany are now the highest in the world. In Germany, for example, one-kilowatt hour costs 31 cents, while in neighboring Poland the price is just 13 cents. This makes Germany a cautionary tale at best.

The refugee crisis also confirmed Germany’s missionary claim that “By German values shall the world be healed.” Merkel sincerely believed that she could get the whole of Europe to agree to open its borders. That, of course, was not the case. Like dominoes, one country after another closed its borders to illegal immigrants, and Germany was left entirely isolated with its refugee policy.

The naive expectation that other countries would follow the same maxims as Germany has also been evident throughout the coronavirus crisis. German EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen was deeply disappointed to realize that the UK and U.S. governments put the interest of their own countries first, which is a dangerous manifestation of unbridled “nationalism” from the German point of view. In life, however, disappointment is often preceded by self-deception. And in this case, it was recklessly naive to assume that the governments of other countries would also put protecting their own people at the bottom of the agenda.

Rainer Zitelmann is a German historian and sociologist.

Source: https://nationalinterest.org/feature/fear-nationalism-germany-killing-its-people-181737

The post The Fear of Nationalism in Germany Is Killing Its People first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

Negotiations for the agreement took nearly seven years, and there were intense discussions between the EU Commission and top Chinese officials throughout 2020. In the last days of the year, a decision was made to go ahead with the agreement. Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel, acting as EU term president, and Chinese President Xi reportedly pressed to close the agreement. But there is an important nuance here: the agreement has not been actually been signed yet, as the negotiations took place via video conferencing. And for the agreement to come into force, ratification by all EU member states as well as the consent of the EU Parliament is necessary.

It is clear that this process will be quite painful and there is a good chance that it could fail. In fact, it is even possible to go further and claim that Germany is betting on this possibility.

So why has Germany followed such a path? There are three reasons: First of all, Germany is heavily dependent on its trade with China. It was its trade with China that saved Germany from the global financial crisis in 2008. Moreover, trade with China is still highly significant to Germany today, with trade volumes of around 250 billion dollars. Secondly, Germany and to a large extent France, have been particularly uncomfortable with the European Union being treated as a second-tier power by the United States under the Trump administration.  Brexit has been the last straw in this context. The message given to the United States with the agreement was that Europe is far more important than the United States thought and that the EU cannot be ignored. Finally, with the CAI agreement, China has also been warned about the importance of Europe within the scope of great power competition.

At this point, it is necessary to draw attention to the race between France and Germany in order to become the dominant power in the EU after Brexit. With Brexit, France has become the EU’s sole nuclear power and its most powerful one in terms of conventional forces as well. France’s historical approach to European autonomy is a well-known phenomenon. Trump’s unilateral policies and his refusal to take Europe into account enabled France to draw Germany to its side within the scope of European autonomy. However, with the election of Biden, Germany is expected to return to its traditional approach in the context of transatlantic relations. This has been made clear in speeches by the German Defense Minister, Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer. Kramp-Karrenbauer emphasized that an autonomous capacity in military and political matters can strengthen Europe’s hand within the context of existing transatlantic ties with the United States. She also added that Europe could not provide nuclear deterrence without the US nuclear umbrella. The main reason for this approach is to prevent France from taking the helm of the European Union in the absence of the balance provided by the United Kingdom. The struggle of these two powers to gain the leadership of Europe lies at the root of many problems in European history. It was the presence of the United States in the continent after the Second World War that kept these two powers from any conflict. The US presence has been also the most essential factor in Europe’s welfare today. For this reason, the US presence in the continent and the continuation of the transatlantic relationship have been of vital importance for Germany.

Against France’s clear military superiority, Germany has undoubted economic superiority. The economic locomotive of the European Union, so to speak, is Germany. Germany needs China and Asian economies to maintain this superiority. In this context, it does not hesitate to oppose any attempt that will jeopardize its commercial relations with China. In this respect, the attempts of the United States to cut off trade relations with China altogether cannot find any support from Germany. However, Germany also looks for ways to balance the assertive and aggressive attitude of Xi Jinping’s China. For this reason, it wants to use its relationship with the United States as leverage against China as well.

When all these elements come together, it is an indisputable fact that Germany is in a very delicate position. In fact, the CAI agreement itself is a consequence created by such a balance. Germany forced the conclusion of such an agreement for the sake of not spoiling its relations with China, and it has restored confidence in China. On the other hand, the message was given to the United States, especially to the incoming Biden administration, that Europe is an important power that cannot be ignored. Nobody will be able to blame Germany if the agreement is not implemented due to an EU member state refusing to ratify it. This means that Europe, and Germany, hold some serious leverage against the United States as well as China.

Looking ahead, both great powers will have to play the game by taking Europe into account. In fact, the European Union, and especially Germany, could gain a crucial position in playing a balancing role that will keep the great power rivalry between the US and China from getting out of hand. Hopefully, the result will be a more balanced and stable global order. Such will be one of the most important tasks of the new administrations in the United States and Germany in the coming period.

The views expressed in this article are those of the authors alone and do not necessarily reflect those of Geopoliticalmonitor.com or any institutions with which the authors are associated.

Source: https://www.eurasiareview.com/12012021-eu-china-investment-agreement-casts-europe-as-a-great-power-oped/

The post EU-China Investment Agreement Casts Europe As A Great Power – OpEd first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

“So we have finally found an agreement. It was a long and winding road but we have got a good deal to show for it,” E.U. Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said at a press conference.

The deal should avert a chaotic economic break between the two sides on New Year’s Day, after fears of lines at ports and tariffs between the two sides if no deal was achieved.

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U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson was expected to speak moments later but tweeted “The deal is done” as his E.U. counterpart was speaking.

Boris Johnson@borisjohnson

The deal is done.

The agreement now goes to the 27 E.U. nations seeking unanimous approval, as well as the blessing of the E.U. and British parliaments. The deal had appeared doomed just weeks ago, with issues such as E.U. fishing rights in U.K. waters proving to be a sticking point, and Johnson warning Brits that they should prepare for no deal.

Reuters reported this week that E.U. negotiators were prepared to cut the value of its fish catch in British waters by about 25%, but Britain wanted a 30-35% reduction. Meanwhile, the U.K. wants to limit E.U. access over three years, while the E.U. wants a six-year timeframe.

But after resolving the remaining fair-competition and almost all fisheries issues on Wednesday, negotiators combed through hundreds of pages of legal text that should become the blueprint for a post-Brexit relationship.

The details are likely to be scrutinized and widely debated ahead of its ratification in London and from European nations. It will remain to be seen if key Eurosceptics in Johnson’s Conservative Party will accept it.

But   one of the architects of the original Brexit referendum, declared victory ahead of the announcement – even as he expressed possible reservations about the details of the accord.

“On the big stuff, the war is over,” he said.

Despite the breakthrough, key aspects of the future relationship between the 27-nation bloc and its former member remain uncertain. But it leaves the mutually dependent but often fractious U.K.-E.U. relationship on a much more solid footing than a disruptive no-deal split.

ON THE CUSP OF BREXIT TRADE DEAL, EU AND UK HASH OUT FINAL DETAILS

Johnson will now claim to have delivered on the promise that won him a resounding election victory a year ago: “Get Brexit Done.”

Even with a deal, trade between Britain and the E.U. will face customs checks and some other barriers on Jan. 1, when the U.K. leaves the bloc’s single market and customs union. A trade deal would avert the imposition of tariffs and duties that could cost both sides billions in trade and hundreds of thousands of jobs. Britain withdrew from the E.U. on Jan. 31, and an economic transition period expires on Dec. 31.

Over the past few days, Johnson and von der Leyen have been drawn more and more into the talks, speaking by phone in a bid to unblock negotiations that have dragged on for months, hampered by the coronavirus pandemic and by the two sides’ opposing views of what Brexit entails.

Rumors of a pre-Christmas trade deal surfaced in recent days based on progress on the main outstanding issues: fishing, fair competition, and resolution of future disputes.

Businesses on both sides are clamoring for a deal that would save tens of billions in costs.

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While both sides would suffer economically from a failure to secure a trade deal, most economists think Britain would take a greater hit, because it is smaller and more reliant on trade with the E.U. than the other way around.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Source: https://www.foxbusiness.com/markets/uk-eu-brexit-trade-deal

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The EU’s largest economy is preparing for an economic downturn as German consultant Professor Roland Berger said millions would be left out of work. While a survey of 7,000 German companies by Munich Ifo Institute found a fifth (21 percent) sees their own existence threatened due to the coronavirus crisis.

Free Democratic Party leader Christian Lindner said the coronavirus crisis had acted like a “fire accelerator” to Germany’s economic woes, saying: ”We are in a very critical situation”.

Meanwhile, the survey found travel agencies and tour operators in Germany are worried about their future with 85 percent saying their existence is at risk.

While 76 percent of hoteliers fear for their company.

Angela Merkel has been delivered a blow (Image: GETTY )

Germany’s economy has been crippled by the coronavirus crisis (Image: GETTY )

However, it is good news for the chemical industry, with only six percent of companies concerned about their future and just two percent in the construction industry.

Economic experts warned of an “insolvency wave” in the next coming months.

Roland Berger warned of the long-lasting damage to the German economy, telling BILD: “There is a risk that we will have between four and five million unemployed.

READ MORE: Brexit warning: UK told Angela Merkel will NOT help secure trade deal

Angela Merkel’s nation faces a wave of bankruptcies (Image: GETTY )

“If a pub with three waiters goes bankrupt, there will be three unemployed who will be in the statistics for a long time.

“Because these are not jobs that will be rebuilt the day after tomorrow.”

Angela Merkel’s nation has already seen the coronavirus pandemic cost thousands of jobs.

German companies say they are worried about their future (Image: GETTY )

Germany returns to some normality in the wake of the coronavirus lockdown (Image: GETTY )

According to the Employment Agency (BA), the number of unemployed stood at 2.8 million in June – around 637,000 more than a year earlier.

Ifo boss Clemens Fuest warned, “the number of unemployed will rise to around three million in the third quarter”.

It comes after the EU Commission warned Germany would be hit by a downturn of -6.3 percent from -6.5 percent forecast in May and next year’s rebound.

The report also warned the eurozone economy would drop deeper into recession this year and rebound less steeply in 2021 than previously thought, with France, Italy, and Spain struggling the most due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The EU executive said the 19-nation single currency area would contract by a record 8.7 percent this year before growing by 6.1 percent in 2021.

In early May, the Commission had forecast a 2020 downturn of 7.7 percent and a 2021 rebound of 6.3 percent.

Meanwhile, German Chancellor Ms Merkel will meet with Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez ahead of a July 17-18 summit to discuss a planned European Union recovery fund.

Spanish government spokeswoman Maria Jesus Montero said: “Spain’s future is at stake in the coming days,” regarding the negotiations over the fund, from which Spain hopes to receive around €140 billion.

Additional reporting by Monika Pallenberg

Source: https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/1306239/angela-merkel-news-germany-economy-germany-coronavirus-news-merkel

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In July, a nondescript blue vessel drifting along the Italian coast became the latest flashpoint in Europe’s “migration crisis.” For the people on board, mostly from African countries, the Sea-Watch 3 was their last hope for escaping desperate circumstances in their homelands. To many onshore, the humanitarian vessel was political contraband. The Italian authorities refused to let the boat dock, as the right-wing Interior Minister Matteo Salvini complained that other European nations were forcing Italy to take in migrants it did not want. A standoff ensued between the Italian government and the scrappy 31-year-old captain Carola Rackete. After two weeks adrift, during which conditions on board grew increasingly desperate — migrants were reportedly at risk of self-harm — Rackete drove into the port, clashing with a patrol boat. Eventually, France, Germany, Finland, Luxembourg and Portugal agreed to take in the 40 migrants on board, Rackete was arrested, and Salvini called the ordeal “an act of war.”

Johannes Bayer, chairman of Sea-Watch, the humanitarian project that runs the boat, called Rackete’s actions an act of necessity. “No European institution is willing to take responsibility and to uphold human dignity at Europe’s border in the Mediterranean. This is why we have to take responsibility ourselves… The guarantee of human rights must not be conditional to a passport or to any EU negotiations, they have to be indivisible.”

The standoff reflected a crisis of Europe’s own creation: For years, EU leaders have watched Europe’s southern waters morph into a mass grave for migrants. Most come from Africa, Afghanistan, and the Middle East, and many have endured unspeakable trauma — war, torture, rape, even enslavement. The problem is not so much that the continent “has no room” for them, as conservative politicians often argue. Rather, because the EU is so riven with nationalist and racial anxieties, it has repeatedly failed to develop any sort of coordinated scheme for supporting migrants in their arrival and resettlement — not just those who cross the Mediterranean, but also those who enter by land through the Balkans. Meanwhile, border authorities cannot stop the smuggling boats from setting off for European shores, nor can they stop humanitarian groups from rescuing stranded people from the sea.

To avoid further border clashes, some EU member states have floated a disembarkation and relocation plan, which aims to move people from their arrival point, usually the coast of Italy, to other member states, and to more efficiently screen migrants to determine who might qualify for humanitarian protection. Relocation is just a temporary step — allowing people to stay while their legal cases are wending through the asylum process — but as a stopgap measure, the plan is part of an incremental effort to push more member states to share the “burden” of handling Europe’s so-called “migrant crisis.”

The new “Joint declaration of intent on a controlled emergency procedure” was drafted by the two frontline transit countries, Italy and Malta — and two major destination countries, Germany and France — along with Finland, which holds the rotating position of EU president. Presented at a mini-summit held in late September, the framework hinges on recruiting other member states to volunteer to serve as relocation sites by receiving a designated share of migrants. After an initial security and medical screening, migrants seeking asylum would be relocated and continue their legal processing, while those deemed ineligible for asylum would be returned, with “logistical and operational support” from the European Border and Coast Guard and International Organization for Migration. Relocation would overall take about four weeks.

In a statement to Truthout, an EU Commission spokesperson stated that the proposal had been presented to other member states for discussion, and the Commission “hope[s] that as many Member States as possible will join this collective effort.” So far, only Ireland, Luxembourg and Portugal have reportedly expressed willingness to participate in the scheme.

However, although the relocation proposal might save EU leaders some embarrassment when rescue boats arrive, it would not address the fundamental unfairness of Europe’s immigration regime. Although the plan makes overtures toward law enforcement actions — combating the high-profile crimes of “smuggling” and “human trafficking is vague on legal protections for migrants, and particularly vague on what recourse is available to those deemed ineligible for humanitarian protection. Human rights activists are concerned that the framework leaves open the possibility of returning boats to their departure point: the chaotic, war-torn tip of Libya.

Human Rights Watch (HRW) and Amnesty International argue that the relocation plan should ensure that migrants would not be arbitrarily or unjustly turned back to dangerous circumstances. Philippe Dam, advocacy director of HRW’s Europe and Central Asia Division, tells Truthout, “One thing which is really missing is a commitment to establish the necessary safeguards against unsafe or arbitrary return.”

Sea-Watch, the NGO that runs the rescue vessel that clashed with Italian authorities last summer, is opposed to any forced return, advocating instead for the relocation of all migrants who disembark, not just those deemed to have a chance at asylum. “Relocation should be automatic/immediate” for all migrants, the group said in a statement, while also “taking into account individual needs and connections such as family, community and social links conceived in a broad sense.”

MOAS, a humanitarian NGO that runs rescue ships along the Mediterranean, criticized the agreement for not incorporating the role of civil society-led rescue operations — suggesting that the proposal prioritizes official search-and-rescue vessels and excludes NGO ships: “Rather than looking for a framework through which to work with Search and Rescue NGOs, the approach is still to imply an incompatibility between state and non-state actors, which is something MOAS simply does not agree with.”

Conservative EU officials, meanwhile, criticize the plan as an encroachment on sovereignty. The right-wing Hungarian government — which has been accused of numerous human rights abuses against migrants on its border, and recently tried to criminalize the act of aiding migrants — dismissed the relocation proposal as an attempt to unilaterally impose “quotas” on member states.

Past efforts at distributing Europe’s “irregular” migrants have foundered, especially amid an increasingly right-wing, nationalistic political climate. In Central and Eastern Europe particularly, right-wing nationalist politicians argue most new arrivals are not genuine refugees, but “economic migrants” seeking work. (Rights advocates argue that drawing this sharp distinction between economic migrants and refugees is illogical, since asylum policies are often extremely restrictive, and even people who come to seek work are often fleeing extremely desperate circumstances.)

“Refugee and asylum and migration issues have become very toxic in Europe,” Jeff Crisp, a research associate with Oxford’s Refugee Studies Centre, told Truthout. Right-wing politicians are exploiting the public’s fears, he added: “If they can say, well, we’re not allowing these people to set foot on our territory … then that gives the impression of being more in control, and is more likely [to gain] popular support among the electorate.”

The rising death toll at sea, on the other hand, factors little into the electoral calculus of many European politicians. This year, about 1,078 migrants have died at sea as of late October, mostly in the central Mediterranean. There were even more deaths in previous years, peaking at 3,780 in 2016. Deaths typically occur when smuggling ships begin to cross over from a war-torn and chaotic region in Libya, get stranded at sea, and are not rescued in time by a passing vessel. But in 2019, with more than 77,900 arrivals by sea in Europe, the numbers of both attempted crossings and fatalities are down sharply from previous years— driven in large part by stricter patrols, led by the Libyan Coast Guard in collaboration with European authorities.

Beyond temporary relocation, the longer-term challenge is the establishment of a functional Common European Asylum System that can fairly and efficiently review asylum cases with standardized procedures. Previous attempts to develop a more consistent, stable EU-wide legal infrastructure have failed. Overall, since 2015, more than 34,700 individuals have been relocated from Italy and Greece, but mostly on an ad-hoc basis. They then enter a disjointed, heavily backlogged asylum system. While about 50,000 people have been granted asylum over the past few years, as of late 2018, some 878,600 requests for asylum were pending, and rejection rates are on the rise.

Hostile terrain

Meanwhile, Italy’s coastline is becoming increasingly hostile territory for migrant aid organizations. Last March, the EU, under pressure from Italy, decided to suspend the patrol boats of the humanitarian rescue program Operation Sophia. Last December, the Aquarius, a rescue boat operated by the NGOs Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) and SOS Méditerranée, was forced to end operations, after coming under what it called “sustained attacks” by EU authorities — being forced to remain adrift off the Italian coast, stripped of its registration and even slapped with criminal charges, despite having saved more than 33,000 people over three years.

Aid groups want more than a disembarkation scheme. In a statement to Truthout, Sonal Marwah, MSF humanitarian affairs manager for Libya search and rescue, said that the recent discussions on disembarkation “were a promising first step,” but the lack of support from member states “has been disheartening.” In the immediate term, Marwah added, another MSF ship, the Ocean Viking, currently remains stranded offshore with 104 people aboard. “We can only hope in lieu of a permanent disembarkation mechanism, states will act humanely and allow these vulnerable people to disembark to safety,” she said.

EU officials insist that their crackdowns on humanitarian vessels are a form of “deterrence,” assuming that by making death at sea more likely, migrants — who have likely braved multiple forms of trauma already — will suddenly be frightened out of making the final boat journey to Europe.

Emmanuel, a Cameroonian refugee, described the brutal reality of “deterrence” in testimony to Amnesty International: A passing ship refused to rescue him and others trapped on two stranded dinghies. The crew said the refugees would have to be retrieved by the Libyan authorities. Meanwhile, Emmanuel recalled, “I could see people dying on the other boat, pieces of boat were floating and bodies too. [By the time] a small Libyan ship came to get us … all the people on the other dinghy had died.”

In addition to “deterrence” strategies, some European officials also seek to “externalize” their migration problem by warehousing refugees abroad. To block the Western route through Greece, where many Syrians and others crossed in recent years, refugees have been pushed back to Turkey and housed in sprawling detention camps, even as they are seeking resettlement in Europe. (Grim conditions in Turkish refugee camps, however, are driving more migration to neighboring Greece, creating another pressure point on the EU.)

The EU has also collaborated with the notoriously brutal Libyan security forces to patrol the Mediterranean and turn back migrant smuggling vessels. The effort to push back migrants is unraveling, however, as civil conflict in Libya escalates and leaves migrants trapped in squalid, violent detention centers.

Europe’s main response to the Libyan crisis has been to shove migrants even farther away. Following the recent horrific bombing of a Libyan detention facility, EU and United Nations authorities have developed an ad-hoc relocation scheme that has landed about 500 evacuated migrants in Rwanda, where they will reportedly be granted asylum-seeker status. It is unclear what kind of opportunities they will have to seek resettlement in Europe.

Anneliese Baldaccini, Amnesty’s executive officer for asylum and migration, says the Mediterranean crisis is not due to a lack of physical or economic capacity to admit more refugees. After all, countries in the Middle East have been sheltering millions of regional refugees, whereas Europe’s migrant influx is proportionally vastly smaller.

“The problem is the lack of solidarity,” Baldaccini says, “because if you consider the EU as a whole, there is certainly scope to put in place better policies of support and reception.” Referring to the member states’ collective inaction on border policy, Baldaccini adds, “It’s always the case that they very well unite on more repressive and regressive measures than on progressive measures.”

Europe has not always been so resistant to migrants, however. In the 1980s, some member states, including Italy, Spain and Germany, granted amnesty to unauthorized migrants within their borders. However, today, such measures have generally been discouraged by the European Pact on Immigration and Asylum; ironically, the EU-wide standards for controlling immigration have also impeded member states’ ability to adopt more open policies than their neighbors.

Nonetheless, Europeans are uniting to defend migrants’ rights at the grassroots, developing “translocal” campaigns and weaving together cities across Europe to demand humanitarian and legal protections for migrants. The rescue vessels at sea, refugee aid workers helping migrants navigate Hungarian borders, and ordinary citizens staging direct-action protests to stop deportations — the wave of humanitarian activism in recent months has shown that European citizens and EU ministers are diverging sharply on the question of borders.

So migrants keep coming, despite the obstacles, and people keep aiding them, despite the law. And together, it’s the migrants and their allies in the EU, not the ministers, who are shaping the frontiers of Europe, demonstrating that the borders themselves are the problem.

Source: https://www.salon.com/2019/11/12/as-europe-shuts-out-migrants-activists-are-pushing-back_partner/

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The post Europe on brink of new refugee crisis ‘EVEN GREATER’ than 2015 – German Interior Minister first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

Brussels believes that it has completed almost all the necessary no-deal planning, except it may try to organize improved communication between relevant national agencies and the EU Commission.

It regards the idea being floated by many Brexiter MPs and the CBI that there will be mini deals before 31 October to lessen the shock of no-deal as wholly laughable. ‘The CBI stuff last week was desperate nonsense’ said one EU source. ‘It is not the EU’s job to mitigate Brexit’s impact on the UK. No-deal means no deal – not mini deals’.

So the main residual area of attention for the Commission is to work with Dublin on how to maintain the integrity of the single market in the absence of the backstop and how to limit the damage to the Irish economy. Or to put it another way, if Boris Johnson and Dominic Cummings’s cunning plan is to go hell for leather for no-deal in the expectation that the EU will panic at the last and offer them a seamless, frictionless path to a new trade and security deal, sans backstop and with the divorce payment made conditional, they should be prepared to have their bluff called.

So here is the question that will determine the fate of this nation: which of the EU on the one hand and Johnson on the other has the greater reputation for conducting reverse ferrets? And if you think neither will show flexibility, you should be bracing for the pound to fall to parity with the euro very soon and to properly assess how a no-deal Brexit will affect you, and what you can do to soften the impact.

Robert Peston is ITV’s Political Editor. This article originally appeared on his ITV news blog.

Source: https://blogs.spectator.co.uk/2019/08/whos-bluffing-boris-johnson-or-the-eu/

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