Interview: Reform of Dublin regulation key to managing migration crisis: MEPs

The key to managing migration crisis is to reform the Dublin regulation, which stipulated that the first country refugees set foot in is responsible for their asylum claims, top EU lawmakers told Xinhua in exclusive interviews.

Both Cecile Kyenge, member of the European Parliament (Socialists and Democrats group), and her colleague Elmar Brok, chairman of the European Parliament's foreign affairs committee, believed it is necessary to update the Dublin regulation.

According to Kyenge, a revision is crucial because now the rule is stopping the free movement of people, damaging the solidarity of member states and creating unbalanced share of responsibilities even at financial level.

She said the European Parliament has proposed to create a centralized system under which all the EU institutions and agencies like the European Asylum Support Office (EASO) are going to be involved to play an active role.

Echoing Kyenge, Brok said:"The main problem of Dublin regulation was that we let countries at outside borders bear the burdens and costs all alone. That was a structural mistake and because of it we are on the way to change the rule now. "

"Now more and more EU member states understand the need to find a common solution to solve the problem," the German MEP added.

Under the Dublin system, once asylum seekers are registered in the first country of arrival, they are unable to seek asylum in other member states of the European Union (EU), creating tremendous pressures on states situated at outside borders of the bloc, such as Italy and Greece, which has seen an influx of more than one million migrants since 2015.

Asked about the migration crisis in 2016, Brok said there were some positive developments. "In comparison with last year, we are in a better situation because the migrants coming from Middle East is almost stopped in Turkey," he said.

The EU-Turkey deal to curb refugee influx into Europe came into force in March. Under the agreement, Turkey agreed to take back all undocumented migrants, while the EU has Syrian refugees resettled from Turkish camps on a one-for-one basis.

However, Brok added: "we still have not curbed the influx of migrants from North African countries like Egypt and Libya. This is still a problem for the EU."

Brok said it is necessary to look at the root causes.

Pointing out that Africa will double its population in the next 25 years, he said it's imperative for the EU to develop "a really integrated and coherent foreign and security development policy".

"Otherwise we will have big problems,"the German MEP warned.

For Kyenge, the year 2016 was also not completely positive. "we made some steps forward but the negative points are still a lot, like the build-up of walls, the harmful attitude of some governments and the lack of solidarity among member states."

The Italian MEP slammed the construction of physical barriers in some members of the EU, saying,"it is more expensive financially to close borders than to apply integration policies."

"If Italy closes its borders, it would spend in one year more than 10 billion euros(10.6 billion U.S.dollars), whereas Europe would have to pay more than 150 billion euros, "said Kyenge, also former minister of integration of Italy, citing a report of the Artisans and Small Businesses Association of Italian city of Mestre.

Seeing immigrants as positive resources, the MEP argued that it's necessary to invest in integration and cultural diversity, not only because this investment is less expensive, but also because it help enhance the attractiveness of a country.

Questioned about the worsening security situation across Europe after influx of illegal migrants, Kyenge insisted that migration crisis should not be linked with terrorism, because the possibility of recruiting terrorists among disadvantaged people always exists, and the recruitment is "done through internet."

Brok stressed that intelligence cooperation is more important.

"On this issue, we did some progress but this is not enough," the German MEP said, " I see that international cooperation on intelligence is going to be better, but too many countries in the EU are reluctant to establish proper intelligence cooperation."

Apart from terrorism, another issue often linked with the migration crisis is the rise of populism and the extreme right-wing parties in Europe.

Both Kyenge and Brok noted that migration crisis is now exploited by populists who aim to create an enemy.

"This criminalization of immigration is creating a lot of damages," Kyenge said.

Brok said, "the extreme right doesn't have concrete solution to solve the crisis; they just create enemies like migrants in this case."

To curb the influence of populism, EU members should communicate more effectively with their people on who is coming in, Kyenge said, adding that a more global approach is needed.

Sending a final message, the former Italian minister said, "In March 2017 we are going to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the Treaty of Rome which was at the base of the European integration, I think that we should go back to this old spirit and values, starting from a solidarity able to challenge fear and egoism." (1 euro = 1.06 U.S. dollars) Endit