(Granada) Populist Polish and Hungarian leaders vehemently demonstrated their opposition to reform of the European migration system at an EU summit on Friday, which they cannot block, two days after an agreement -key between Member States.
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, a regular in diatribes against Brussels, went so far as to speak of “rape” in thunderous declarations upon his arrival at this informal summit in Granada, in the south of Spain. “If you are legally violated, forced to accept something you don’t like, how do you expect to reach a compromise and an agreement? It’s impossible,” he said.
“We are not afraid of the diktats that come from Brussels and Berlin,” thundered the Polish Prime Minister, Mateusz Morawiecki. He reiterated his refusal to have a system of “distribution of irregular migrants” imposed on him, ten days before legislative elections in Poland which promise to be close.
PHOTO JUAN MEDINA, REUTERS
Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki
To express their dissatisfaction, in a primarily symbolic approach, the two countries on Friday blocked the adoption of a joint declaration on immigration at the end of the summit.
The migration issue, one of the most thorny among the Twenty-Seven, was put on the agenda of this summit at the request of the head of the Italian government Giorgia Meloni following the recent influx of migrants on the small Italian island of Lampedusa, which recalled the urgency of a European response.
In recent days, the Spanish archipelago of the Canaries has also seen an increase in entries.
On Wednesday, the ambassadors of EU countries finally agreed on a regulation setting up a mandatory solidarity mechanism between member states in the event that one of them is faced with an “exceptional situation » linked to “massive” arrivals of migrants at its borders.
The text, which also provides for a regime derogating from traditional asylum procedures, less protective for migrants, had to be the subject of a compromise to overcome German, then Italian, reluctance.
“Differences in geographical location”
This regulation, the last piece of the EU Asylum and Migration Pact which must still be the subject of negotiations with the European Parliament, was approved by the Member States by qualified majority as the treaties provide, and not by unanimity as demanded by Poland and Hungary.
The latter voted against the text, while Austria, Slovakia and the Czech Republic abstained.
Giorgia Meloni once again expressed her satisfaction with this text on Friday, believing that “the position that Italy has held for a year today dominates”.
“Today we found ourselves in a European Council where 27 countries agree that the priority is to stop illegal immigration,” said the far-right leader.
She assured that she “understood the position” of her Hungarian and Polish counterparts, stressing that the differences in views on migration reform between her and these leaders were due to “differences in geographical location”.
French President Emmanuel Macron welcomed the fact that the migration issue “is moving forward as it should with a qualified majority”.
Poland and Hungary demanded, without success, that the summit’s final declaration include a reference to the need for unanimity to adopt migration reform. In response, they refused to endorse the paragraph of the joint declaration relating to immigration.
This is what already happened during a summit in Brussels at the end of June, when the Polish-Hungarian duo blocked the adoption of conclusions to indicate their opposition to two other texts of the migration pact approved by the Member States shortly before.
The declaration on immigration, endorsed in the name of the President of the European Council Charles Michel in the absence of consensus of the 27, affirms the need to respond to irregular immigration “immediately and with determination” and to “intensify the returns” of irregular migrants .
He also mentions the EU’s determination to establish “mutually beneficial global partnerships with countries of origin and transit”, such as the one concluded in July with Tunisia in order to reduce the number of migrant arrivals from its territory.
This memorandum of understanding is, however, the subject of controversy, linked to concerns about respect for the rights of migrants in this country, but also to criticism from certain Member States who have complained of not having been sufficiently involved in its negotiation.
Recent statements by Tunisian President Kais Saied, refusing the European funds that were allocated to Tunisia, describing them as “insignificant”, have further fueled doubts about this partnership.