Every day, the correspondents’ club describes how the same news story is illustrated in other countries.
In one week, more than 12,000 migrants arrived on the Italian island of Lampedusa. The impressive images caused a reaction in the countries of the European Union, which are divided between calls for solidarity and anti-immigration speeches.
In Spain, a call for solidarity and a common migration policy
The Spanish Minister of Foreign Affairs, José Manuel Albares, on Tuesday, September 18, asked the countries of the European Union to show solidarity with the migration crisis currently raging on the Italian island of Lampedusa and, in general, with the countries who are on the front line in welcoming migrants. Spain has for years defended a united European migration policy, where the northern countries would also welcome migrants, instead of turning their backs on the southern countries which are the main affected. Minister José Manuel Albares also insisted on the need for EU countries to agree on a migration and asylum pact. This is also one of the objectives that the head of government Pedro Sánchez set when he assumed the Spanish presidency of the Council of the EU last July. According to José Manuel Albares, “the solution can only be European because people do not come to this or that country, they come to Europe”. He criticized populist responses to migration, recalling the suffering of migrants who risk their lives.
In Poland, an anti-immigration election campaign hides visas issued for bribes
In Poland, the Lampedusa migration crisis reinforces the anti-immigration discourse of the ruling party, in the middle of the electoral campaign. This is the favorite subject of the PIS (“Law and Justice”), in power since 2015: to scare with immigration which would put Poland “on fire and blood”. In a video that it hastened to publish, the PIS speaks of an army of migrants which is invading Europe and which will invade Poland if the opposition wins the elections. The ruling party therefore proposes to limit immigration as much as possible. We also see, on the border with Belarus, how those who manage to cross the wall are pushed back or put in these monitored centers. Faced with the new European refugee relocation program, the PIS is campaigning so that “Warsaw does not become Lampedusa” and has planned a referendum on this subject in parallel with the October 15 election.
However, for several days, a scandal has shaken Poland because of visas. Journalists discovered that the PIS was giving visas in return for bribes to refugees from the Middle East, Africa and Asia. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs reportedly received up to $40,000 to authorize, without any verification, multiple entry Schengen visas. Daily life Gazeta Wyborcza still speaks of 600,000 visas. Obviously, the ruling party speaks of manipulation of the opposition, and assures that it would have quickly managed the crisis internally.