Fear overshadows charity

As I left the office in the early evening on Friday I saw two police coaches loaded with dejected illegal immigrants driving past Castille out of Valletta.

I guessed they were en route from the law courts to one or other detention centre. I was filled with mixed feelings, some of compassion and concern for the detainees and others of frustration and helplesness at the world leaders' inability to deal with the problem.

Although I feel for any human being who motivated by desperation finds him/herself in such a predicament. I also realise that something has to be done to work out a humane and practical solution to this evergrowing problem.

A few hours earlier I had asked Günter Verheugen, EU Enlargement Commissioner, what policies the EU was formulating to deal with this. His answer was that plans were under way to create a force to protect coasts and that directives dealing with the problem will develop very fast.

Well, the latter will be an improvement. Last May was the first we heard about an EU force to tackle illegal immigration.

At a meeting in Rome EU interior ministers gave the go-ahead to the creation of a new European border police force to curb illegal immigration.

And according to British Prime Minister Tony Blair, a European agreement on immigration was drawn up three years previously, but in a strongly-worded letter to Josè Maria Aznar, his Spanish counterpart, last spring he complained that the EU was falling behind in implementing it.

The ministers' recommendations in Rome were then to be considered by heads of government at the June European summit in Seville.

Illegal immigration was the top item on the agenda during the summit. The EU leaders debated the feasibility of a common policy to address not only illegal immigration, but also political asylum and family reunification.

The summit agreed to increase security at external borders, start some joint operations between national forces, and pass new rules encouraging increased penalties for people smuggling.

A compromise regarding the possible use of sanctions against countries not co-operating with the immigration policies of the EU was reached. The EU "may unanimously find that a third country has shown an unjustified lack of co-operation in joint management of migration flows. (It) may adopt measures without jeopardising the objectives of development co-operation" and "inadequate co-operation could hamper the establishment of closer relations."

This is all rather vague, commented Paul Reynolds, BBC News Online World Affairs correspondent reporting on the summit last June.

The Economist was blunter: "Snooze, snooze, the summit was a non-event". The EU summit in Seville ended with only limited progress on the main agenda item - immigration policies.

Although the EU claims that the summit was a success, it seems that in reality the results were less impressive, providing few concrete changes, The Economist claimed.

The summit agreed to increase security at external borders with joint operations at ports and airports, the creation of a special unit of heads of border control from member states, set up a network of liaison officers and initiate a study for using EU money. Pass new rules encouraging increased penalties for people smuggling. Review visa requirements for outside countries.

Adopt, by the end of the year, a policy of speeded-up repatriations for those who do not qualify (especially to Afghanistan) and speed up the adoption of common rules for the treatment of asylum seekers.

The recent rise of populist anti-immigration parties throughout Europe is one of three specific problems, seen as possibly postponing enlargement even longer.

Several observers expressed concerns at what they see as moves to turn Europe into a fortress, and warned that continually identifying immigration as a problem, rather than a potential resource, could only benefit the far right.

"Most experts recognise that European Union countries need immigrants to maintain a healthy economy. And according to many of them, the rise of the far right rests upon a fundamental paradox: immigration, far from destroying European societies, could ultimately be their saviour.

"Elderly people made up some 13 per cent of the population in 1975 and could be as many as 22 per cent by 2025. Birth rates in European countries are falling.

"All this means that the only way that the working population can be maintained, let alone expanded, is through immigration," says Jonathan Marcus, BBC regional analyst.

Illegal immigration is an international problem. When I was in Sydney in November 2000 the news there was dominated by the debate on whether the illegal immigrants held in the Woomera detention centre were being treated humanely or not.

And Woomera is rarely out of the news. One horrific story was that selected children were to be removed from the Woomera detention centre to prevent their involvement in hunger strikes and lip-sewing. The Woomera detainees regularly protest over the conditions at the centre and visa processing delays.

Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch, said: "The Australian government tends to give the impression that it is being overrun by asylum-seekers. In reality, Australia takes in a tiny proportion of the world's refugees.

"Over the past few years the Australian government has promoted a climate of xenophobia and hostility towards refugees, asylum-seekers and migrants. The next government has got to do a better job of protecting refugees."

So are governments pandering to xenophobia or promoting it?

Calling illegal immigration "one of the most pressing issues of our time" Mr Blair has also said: "We are not advocating a fortress Europe, but what we are saying is that there has got to be some order and some rules brought into the system."

He added that human trafficking was often underpinned by organised crime, "by people operating in circumstances that are totally outside the boundaries of the law".

"We must be unwavering in our battle to eliminate mafias that deal in human traffic", said Mr Aznar, while recognising the positive factor of integrating legal immigrants in our societies.

It seems that there is general consensus that the way forward is to clamp down hard on human traffickers and document forgers by giving them longer prison terms.

But is it happening? Yesterday I read in the papers that the 95 illegal immigrants who landed in Malta on Thursday evening were arraigned in court on Friday and charged with entering Malta illegally and not having any money to sustain themselves.

A separate item informed me that two men pleaded not guilty on charges of assisting illegal immigrants to enter the country, one was charged with relapsing. Both were released on bail.

Among reasons given by 69 per cent of the sample, in the survey carried in this newspaper today, who had stated that persons who end up in Malta should be considered as breaking the law, 36.2 per cent stated that these persons act illegally when they disembark through a back door.

Other reasons were also given. Among others, the Maltese appear to be afraid that 'Malta could become more attractive for illegal migration' (5.3%) and that 'illegal migrants would take work from Maltese nationals' (1.4%). Fears that immigrants could carry diseases, and that they might one day actually take over Malta, were also aired by some.

These fears are the same as those expressed elsewhere, prompting charges of xenophobia.

The main reasons given by 27.3 per cent of participants who had stated that such immigrants should not be considered as breaking the law were: 'we should commiserate with them' (42.7%); 'they are human beings' (31.7%); 'they are fighting for survival' (1.2%); and 'they have nowhere to go' (1.2%). The reasons given by the participants reveal that these Maltese deeply empathise with the plight of these illegal immigrants and do not condemn them for their actions.

So it seems that more of us veer towards fear rather than charity.

Illegal immigration is obviously more of a problem the smaller the country. We have had 1,000 illegal immigrants arriving here since January alone.

It is understandable that the issue raises controversy, because of the complex moral and physical challenges we are confronted with. The authorities, however, must give more thought to the fate of illegal immigrants returned to countries like Eritrea.

Amnesty International released a statement saying the 223 people deported to Eritrea from Malta had been arrested and taken to a military camp.

The Maltese government defended its decision by stating that the Eritreans had not asked for refugee status despite being warned of the consequences if they did not.

Amnesty International also criticised the "excessive use of force" used by the authorities during the deportation operations. Since the problem is not likely to go away, police training in restraint techniques should be a priority.