EU Faces Complications in Plan to Halt Migrants

BRUSSELS With a flood of impoverished West Africans seeking to enter Europe via Spain's Canary Islands, the European Union scrambled Wednesday to avert a humanitarian crisis but faced challenges due to the lack of a cohesive policy on migration.

The EU decided late Tuesday to deploy planes, boats and rapid-reaction aid teams from eight member states to deal with a new influx of illegal migrants into the Canaries.

On Wednesday, however, the European Commission was unable to agree on a list of countries to which would-be migrants could safely be sent back. EU officials also declined to give details on plans for the emergency force, or even to name all the EU countries involved. They said such matters would be tackled on Tuesday at a meeting in Warsaw of the EU's external border security agency, Frontex.

The EU was spurred to action after more than 1,500 migrants, including small children, made their way to the Canary Islands from Senegal, Mali and other countries last week, overwhelming the Spanish authorities there.

Spain's geographic proximity to Africa has made it a focal point in European efforts to stem a growing flood of illegal immigrants, many of whom arrive after a hazardous journey at sea. Drownings are not uncommon as the migrants crowd into small boats on the long, unguarded coastline of Mauritania and Senegal.

But even as the EU solidified plans to send reinforcements to Spain, EU officials said the commission had been unable to agree on a so-called list of safe countries where illegal migrants could be returned. This is the second time in two years that the EU has failed to agree on such a list.

Franco Frattini, the EU's justice and home affairs commissioner, said the list was essential to prevent "asylum-shopping" by migrants who try to exploit the EU's patchwork of immigration policies by targeting countries seen as most likely to accept their application.

Frattini stressed the necessity of a more collective approach, but noted that the asylum-granting process still depended on individual member states. He said the inclusion of a country on the so-called safe list would not mean that migrants from that country would automatically be rejected.

"The inclusion of a country on the list does not mean at all that responsible committees or national judges will not be obliged to carry out a case-by-case individual evaluation," he said.

EU officials said that initial proposals for a list of mostly African states would now likely be expanded. Earlier drafts of the list had included seven countries: Benin, Botswana, Cape Verde, Ghana, Senegal, Mali and Mauritius. But Frattini said Mali would be excluded because of concerns over the practice of female genital mutilation. He did not say which non-African countries could be put on the list.

The failure to find a consensus at the Commission, the EU's executive branch, spoke loudly of the Union's inability to forge a common policy on migration, one of the main issues currently facing the 465-million-strong bloc.

The EU has been struggling to create a unified approach that would prevent a large influx of illegal immigrants while allowing the admission of the foreign workers Europe needs to offset its ageing workforce.

Friso Roscam Abbing, the EU's spokesman on refugee issues, said the EU was against policies that would erect a "fortress Europe." But he added that the root causes of illegal migration - such as poverty and the lack of rule of law in many African countries - needed immediate attention.

Frattini said the migration crisis had galvanized member states to take action. He said that Frontex, the external border security agency, planned to send two emergency coordination teams to the Canaries to help with the effort, which would include patrolling the coast off Western Africa down to Gambia and Senegal, from where most of the immigrants are sailing.

The surveillance boats and planes would be manned by soldiers and police officers drawn from the EU, he said. His office named Britain, Denmark, Germany, Netherlands, Slovenia and Sweden as six of the eight countries that had offered to help, but would not specify the other two.

Separately, Frattini announced a plan to set up a €628 million, or $807 million, European Refugee Fund that would be used to pay the cost of sending illegal migrants home and for joint EU national surveillance patrols to prevent illegal migrants from entering EU countries.

Collective action has proved difficult in the past, in part because the EU's migration policies are hampered by divergent regulations. EU officials say legitimate refugees sometimes fall through the cracks due to legal loopholes that allow bogus asylum-seekers to exploit the system.

The challenges of forging a common asylum policy intensified after the EU expanded eastward in May 2004, creating a large new frontier for asylum- seekers from countries in Africa, the Balkans and the Middle East. The document-free movement of EU citizens across the bloc's internal borders also has eased the movement of migrants.

The clampdown on illegal migrants has coincided with a growing backlash against immigration across Europe, reflected in tough new asylum rules. In April, EU interior ministers agreed to use more joint charter flights to ease the cost of expelling illegal immigrants. About 200,000 illegal immigrants are expelled from the EU each year, the Commission estimates.

Countries like the Netherlands, Belgium and Ireland have already carried out joint charters to deport thousands of failed asylum seekers. Human rights groups say such flights endanger those forced back to unstable places like Afghanistan, Somalia or Chechnya.

EU officials said privately that the backlash against immigration in the EU had helped to foster consensus in the current crisis.