EU lawmakeres urged to tackle refugee influx
The European Commissioner for Migration has called on European Union (EU) lawmakers to devise a new adaptive strategy to respond to the rapidly increasingly number of refugees arriving at the borders of the bloc’s member states.
Dmitris Avramopoulos made the remarks on Tuesday during a session of the Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs (LIBE) Committee in the European Parliament in Brussels.
“We have to understand that… the unprecedented influx of migrants at our borders and in particular, refugees — is unfortunately the new norm and we will need to adjust our responses accordingly,” said Avramopoulos.
The EU commissioner called for a change in policy “from reacting to emergencies to implementing a comprehensive approach that addresses the migratory challenges at their roots.”
Avramopoulos also called for increased “cooperation with third countries” and urged the EU to “also apply tools from foreign policy, neighborhood policies, development aid and trade in order to achieve the objective of .”
New figures by the EU’s border control agency Frontex showed that more than 7,000 refugees have been rescued from the Mediterranean Sea in the last four days.
EU migration spokeswoman Natasha Bertaud said of those who had been saved that “over 3,500 are still on board rescue vessels and being taken to Italy.”
The EU has seen a surge of arriving migrants. More than 280,000 people entered EU member states illegally last year. Many came from Syria, Eritrea and Somalia and made a perilous sea journey from conflict-torn Libya.
According to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), over 3,200 people died in 2014 alone in the Mediterranean Sea between North Africa and Italy’s Lampedusa. The route has been described by the organization as the world’s deadliest migrant route.
Migration charities say as many as 20,000 people may have died trying to reach Europe by crossing the Mediterranean Sea in the last two decades.
CAH/HJL/HRB
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