adminValletta — Amid a worsening refugee crisis, European Union leaders were due yesterday to open a two-day summit with African partners aimed at finding ways of stemming migration flows into the bloc.
“We are under incredible pressure of events,” EU President Donald Tusk warned on the eve of the meeting in the Maltese capital Valletta, which was expected to be attended by more than 60 African and European leaders.
“EU governments are reviewing over a million asylum applications between them, an all-time record number that would test any developed democracy,” the former Polish prime minister said in a speech to the Maltese parliament.
Even though most EU-bound refugees hail from Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq, and enter via Greece and the Western Balkans, stemming migration flows from Africa is also an important priority for the 28-member bloc.
Citizens from the African countries of Eritrea, Nigeria, Somalia, Sudan and Gambia are among the top 10 migrant nationalities recorded at arrival in Europe by the UN refugee agency UNHCR this year.
The main result of the Malta summit is expected to be the launch of an EU trust fund channelling development aid to Africa into programmes tackling the root causes of migration, such as poverty and conflicts.
Europeans would also like African countries to take back failed asylum seekers and economic migrants. In return, they are offering money and a limited expansion of mobility and legal migration schemes.
It is unclear whether the bargaining process will be successful, while several observers have criticized the EU’s approach as focusing too much on border security and repatriations and too little on development.— News24.
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