Following the failure of the European Council’s summit on December 17-18 to answer positively to UK’s requests regarding EU migrant’s social benefits ban, it was time for the German Councellor and French President to take the lead and try to avoid a possible Brexit. Angela Merkel and Francois Hollande thus proposed to the British Prime Minister […]Brexit Update: EU endorses unprecedented compromise to help Cameron out of the referendum mess he got himself into
December 30, 2015 by Leave a Comment
Following the failure of the European Council’s summit on December 17-18 to answer positively to UK’s requests regarding EU migrant’s social benefits ban, it was time for the German Councellor and French President to take the lead and try to avoid a possible Brexit. Angela Merkel and Francois Hollande thus proposed to the British Prime Minister […]The 28 EU leaders unable to start a relevant debate on migration and Brexit
December 21, 2015 by Leave a Comment
The poor results of last week’s meeting of the 28 EU leaders are reflected in the triviality of the remarks by the Council President Donald Tusk, in summarizing the outcome of the 17 – 18 December gathering in Brussels. His most vivid comment was about the “hard work done and the extreme efficiency of the […]EU to manage external borders against the will of member states; Greece to be the first target
December 17, 2015 by Leave a Comment
Last Tuesday 15 December the European Commission adopted a groundbreaking proposal for the establishment of a powerful European Border and Coast Guard to ensure strong management of the Schengen area external borders and better administration of immigration flows. According to the Commission, this Guard should be able to intervene with or without the consent of […]The representatives of the regions and the cities know better what the EU needs on migration, trade, poverty and taxation
December 14, 2015 by Leave a Comment
The 115th plenary of the European Committee of the Regions (CoR) was convened on 3 and 4 December and discussed a number of burning issues, which have been haunting the European Union during the last difficult years. The CoR is the voice of regions and cities of the European Union. Its 350 members are the […]Unemployment and immigrants haunt the EU; who can offer relief?
December 10, 2015 by Leave a Comment
On Tuesday 1st December, Eurostat the EU statistical service reminded us all that in the euro area the October unemployment rate still remained in the double digit region with 10.7%. Understandably, this is the official percentage of people without a job, while the real unemployment rate may be double that, as this newspaper has proved, […]French elections: by the time the EU economy revives and the migration crisis is solved extremists could take over Europe
December 8, 2015 by 1 Comment
The National Front (FN) of Marine Le Pen won the first round of the regional elections in France while Nikolas Sarkozy’s party came second and the French President Francois Hollande was disappointingly at the third place. The entire Old Continent was shocked last Sunday when it was announced that the FN received 28% and won six out […]EU: Turkey to shelter Syrian refugees and turn other immigrants back in return of €3 billion
December 3, 2015 by Leave a Comment
A genuine Turkish bazaar took place last Sunday in Brussels during the meeting of the EU heads of state or government with the Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu. The horse-trading was about what it will cost the EU to stem of the flow of immigrants who pass through Turkey on their way to Europe. Finally […]EU responds to terror fallout by eroding borderless Europe and molesting the refugees
November 23, 2015 by Leave a Comment
The very title of the Press release which the extraordinary Justice and Home Affairs Council of the European Union issued after its 20 November meeting, is quite indicative of the multiple fractures that the Union suffers after the terrorist attacks, which took place in Paris on 13 November 2015. The title reads as follows: “Conclusions […]Refugee crisis update: EU seeks now close cooperation with Africa while Schulz is shocked to witness live one single wreck full of immigrants
November 11, 2015 by Leave a Comment
Last Monday’s Extraordinary Justice and Home Affairs Council was meant to give just an update on the ongoing refugee crisis, a few days before the summit between EU and African leaders which in Valletta, Malta today and tomorrow. The Interior Ministers convened thus to discuss about the progress shown so far since the Western Balkans’ route summit […]Migration has set EU’s political clock ticking; the stagnating economy cannot help it and Turkey doesn’t cooperate
October 29, 2015 by Leave a Comment
The more action clauses a document of a Western Balkans-EU agreement contains, meant to “improve cooperation and step up consultation between the countries along the migration route”, the less cooperation there will be. That was the case last Sunday 25 October when 11 leaders of Balkan and EU countries met in Brussels. They knew very […]EU takes again positive action on migration crisis while Turkey asks for dear favors in exchange for cooperation
October 28, 2015 by Leave a Comment
A mini-summit took place in Brussels last weekend involving the Western Balkan countries and aiming at tackling the escalating migration crisis in the EU. The outcome was the promotion of a 17-point plan which aspires to tackle the issue. The problem that keeps on lingering though is whether the EU countries will look at the greater good of […]Europe slammed by Turkey’s shaky Erdoğan; both playing with immigrants’ agony
October 19, 2015 by Leave a Comment
Probably the greatest achievement of last Thursday’s European Council was that its conclusions were refuted within hours after they were published. While the official text of the Council results boasts about a “joint action plan with Turkey”, to stem the immigration flows to the EU, the Turkish minister of Foreign Affairs Feridun Sinirlioglu commented otherwise. […]Refugee crisis update: Commission still in panic while Turkey is to be added in the equation
October 2, 2015 by Leave a Comment
It was only last Wednesday that Russia officially launched airstrikes in Syria which are supposed to target terrorist groups such as Islamic State (IS). The attacks however aim at western Syria where “strangely” IS has no activity. Consequently, while Russia is mitigating the war in Syria backing-up Assad and his government, refugees continue leaving massively the […]Why the 33,000 staff European Commission did not have a real contingency plan for the refugee crisis?
September 25, 2015 by Leave a Comment
Last Wednesday the EU leaders convened in Brussels to discuss the migration crisis in view of the decision made by the Interior Ministers one day ago. The Heads of States finally decided to “work together in a spirit of solidarity and responsibility” supporting the positive vote taken by the majority of Ministers at the Extraordinary […]Two major EU projects falter; the Schengen Agreement now freezes and Eurozone fails to resolve the Greek enigma
September 17, 2015 by 2 Comments
The usually so cool north Europeans seem to have lost their composure when the first waves of refugees and immigrants reached their borders. Germany and Austria within a few days made full immigration policy u-turns and finally closed their borders. Both Chancellors, Angela Merkel in Berlin and Werner Faymann in Vienna, said last week they […]The refugee crisis brings to light EU’s most horrible flaws and nightmares
September 16, 2015 by 1 Comment
Last Monday, the EU Interior Ministers convened in Brussels in order to discuss about the quotas of the 120.000 refugees proposed by the European Commission (EC) but didn’t manage again to come to a common decision. Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary belong to the group of countries that are against the latter proposal which […]EU migrant crisis: Germany, France and UK to show the way. Will the rest of the EU follow?
September 9, 2015 by Leave a Comment
The recent migrant crisis keeps on plaguing Europe and our good EU leaders and officials strive to find solutions to tackle it. Jean Claude Juncker, the President of the European Commission (EC), will present today his plans for sharing asylum seekers among the 28 EU countries. It will be a crucial day for Juncker’s Commission because […]Migration crisis will keep deteriorating as common EU political will is simply not there
August 28, 2015 by 1 Comment
The migration crisis in the European Union was the main issue of the Western Balkans Summit yesterday in Vienna, but was largely overshadowed by the deaths of at least 20 refugees who were found dead in a truck in Austria. This tragic event shocked everyone in the Summit who expressed the need for immediate actions by […]Drowning in the Mediterranean this summer? Many happy returns
August 17, 2015 by Leave a Comment
This month the European Commission approved 23 multiannual national programs “under the Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund (AMIF) and the Internal Security Fund (ISF). The total funding for the agreed programs is approximately €2.4 billion, for the period 2014-2020… 22 national programs were already approved in March, and an additional 13 programs will be approved […]EU should promote immigration as a humanitarian issue in order to provide a more permanent solution
August 7, 2015 by 1 Comment
Only a few days after the Calais migration incident, a new shipwreck just 10 miles off the coast of Libya caused the death of 25 people while there are still 200 people missing out of the 600 who were on board. The European Commissioner for Migration, Home Affairs and Citizenship, Dimitris Avramopoulos in a common […]EU seems to fail its moderate migration promises postponing them for end 2015
July 22, 2015 by Leave a Comment
The European Union’s Interior Ministers convened last Monday on migration but didn’t come to the preferred outcome which was set by the EU leaders only one month ago, in June. Many EU member states opposed to the proposed, by the European Council (EC), distribution of the 40.000 asylum seekers coming from Greece and Italy within […]EU to relocate 40,000 migrants across the bloc: first step of a long due substantial reform?
May 29, 2015 by Leave a Comment
The European Union aims to propose the relocation of up to 40,000 asylum seekers who have arrived by boat to the Southern European countries like Italy and Greece across other member states in the next two years. The proposal, which has been fully unveiled by the EU last Wednesday, is part of the plans to reform […]Why is the EU launching a doomed policy in stopping immigrant waves? What are the real targets?
May 21, 2015 by Leave a Comment
For what it’s worth, the Libyan government, the one recognized by Europe and the West, rejected the EU plan to carry out military operations in the country’s territorial waters and soil against the traffickers of immigrants. This reaction by the one of the two Libyan governments is quite understandable, because it’s practically impossible to distinguish […]The EU threatens to occupy Libya militarily; is another colonial war brewing?
April 27, 2015 by Leave a Comment
It was really deplorable to watch the 28 EU leaders who gathered in Brussels last week after the hecatombs of drowned emigrants, to solemnly discuss aggressive military operations on the soil and the sea ports of their Mediterranean neighbours. They decided to use military force and thus kill people, in order to forcefully reverse the […]Why do thousands of migrants need to be drowned for Brussels to wake up?
April 22, 2015 by
The European Union is once more hit by migration. Last Sunday, around 800 illegal immigrants are believed to have died when their ship sank on the way from the Libyan coast to the Italian Island of Lampedusa. As a result, the EU foreign and interior ministers gathered in Luxembourg earlier this week to discuss about the migration crisis […]An Easter Special: Social protection of migrants in Europe as seen through the eyes of European youth
April 6, 2015 by Leave a Comment
European Youth Insights is a platform provided by the European Youth Forum and the European Sting, to allow young people to air their views on issues that matter to them. The following entry is written by Arif Shala, doctoral student at the Ludwig Maximilians University in Munich, Germany. Migration is one of the most pressing issues of our […]Immigration crisis at its very worst: EU to outsource rescue business to North Africa?
March 24, 2015 by Leave a Comment
The freshly released statistics on immigration, which were published by Eurostat last Friday, show that 2014 has been a negative record year for the European Union. Last year, 626,000 people applied for asylum to the EU, with the number of Syrian asylum applicants alone rising to 122,800 from 50,000 in 2013. What those statistics are saying […]Is the EU competent enough to fight human smuggling in 2015?
January 16, 2015 by Leave a Comment
That the European Union is facing its big problem of exorbitant illegal immigration is not news. How can it be in a gigantic region of 28 countries spreading around the Old Continent? And most of all one of the top five coastline lengths in the world with some 70,000 km coasts bordering the Atlantic Ocean, Mediterranean Sea, Black Sea and […]On European immigration: Europe’s Missing Citizens
January 9, 2015 by 1 Comment
European Youth Insights is a platform provided by the European Youth Forum and the European Sting, to allow young people to air their views on issues that matter to them. Written by Arif Shala, Executive Director at the Institute for Economic Development Studies Migration refers to change of residence, it is a more or less a […]France and Poland to block David Cameron’s plans on immigration
December 23, 2014 by Leave a Comment
UK’s Prime Minister David Cameron will probably remember last European Council summit, held in Brussels at the end of last week, not only for the delicate discussions on Russia and talks to improve the functioning of the Eurozone next June. His bid to renegotiate Britain’s relationship with the European Union was one of the hottest […]Cameron’s Conservatives and UKIP are exploiting and cultivating anti-EU immigration sentiment but Labour party isn’t?
November 19, 2014 by Leave a Comment
Currently the significant success of the eurosceptic UKIP party in polarising the British voter in several social issues, like immigration, has set the agenda for other parties to follow. David Cameron and his conservative party has long seen that his electorate gets substantially motivated by anti-immigration campaigns. This is of course part of the general […]Italy’s rescue operation Mare Nostrum shuts down with no real replacement. EU’s Triton instead might put lives at risk
November 4, 2014 by 1 Comment
The European Union’s border control agency Frontex officially launched a mission in the Mediterranean Sea to face the mass attempt of migrants from Africa and the Middle East to reach Europe by boat. And this was not the only official news about this emergency last week. After rumours and denials Italy confirmed last Friday that its […]Hundreds of thousands migrants ready to cross the Mediterranean. Only a local matter?
May 7, 2014 by Leave a Comment
Every year, with the advent of spring temperatures get high and the conditions of the sea improve. This is not just good news for the European citizens, hungry for some mild climate after months of snow and rain, but actually what thousands and thousands of immigrants are waiting for to sail towards Europe, leaving the […]
