Franck Düvell: Essays on Migration and Politics

From November 2016, the number of apprehensions1 of Turkish citizens2 arriving at the external EU border in an irregular fashion began increasing. In April 2017, for the first time numbers hit the 50 apprehensions per month threshold, peaked in October at 529, again in April 2018 at 582 and in May at even 675. In 2017, apprehensions of Turkish nationals arriving irregular at the south eastern EU borders, 2,220, was the second highest number for any nationality whilst apprehensions of Syrians came first at 2,438. (Frontex figures, detection of IBC, 2018-07-06). A further 299 arrived by sea, 13 apprehensions were made at the Central Mediterranean route whilst 72 were made on the Eastern European land route, usually through Ukraine raising the total to 2,604 in 2017. In 2018, so far until May another 2,137 escaped Turkey in an irregular fashion, 2,011 across the land and 126 across the sea borders. In total, since January 2017, 4,741 apprehensions of Turkish nationals were made for irregular entry by EU authorities. The figure for the first six months from January to May 2018 is almost as high as the figure for all arrivals in 2017. So, by the end of this year this is likely to increase further and will reach record levels since recording began in 2009.

On the land borders of the EU, almost as many Turkish nationals arrived as Syrians!

This coincides with the purge after the military coup in July 2016 and an authoritarian if not Fascist turn of the Turkish government under its president Erdogan against many opposition actors. Not only 80,147 persons were imprisoned – among them 156 journalists are currently in prison (EFJ 2018)- whilst 170,172 were dismissed from their jobs and/or got their properties confiscated (see Turkey Purge). This also created a widespread atmosphere of fear in many communities in many parts of the country (e.g. The New Yorker 2017). It can be assumed that such irregular movements are a consequence of the cancellation of passports as, for instance, of the Academics for Peace (Baser et al. 2017), and thus the right to leave the country legally (e.g. The Independent 2016). It also implies a certain level of desperation of those targeted by the Islamist government.

These forced migrations have already claimed some lives. On 13 February, a mother and her two children drowned in the river Evros whilst attempting to get escape to Greece (Purge Turkey). And more recently, on 19 July, a boat with Turkish refugees capsized and four people, a mother and her three children lost their lives (Turkey Purge). It is telling and sad that Turkish citizens have to join the ranks of and have to pursue the same dangerous route as tens of thousands of refugees from Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere.

Once more, Turkey is violating democracy and human rights, persecuting large sections of its citizens and therefore again after 1980 and 1992 becomes a significant sending country of refugees. Any European deals or appeasement are inappropriate.

1 Frontex only records apprehensions, not individuals and since people may try more than once the number of people may be lower than the number of apprehensions

On the one hand, large numbers of Syrians continue entering Turkey. On the other hand, the authorities have constructed a wall whilst reports suggest that border defense forces frequently shoot at and even kill Syrians trying to enter the country.

Source: Mixed Migration Platform (diverse month/years)

By December 2017, 3.4 million Syrian refugees were recorded in Turkey. From September 2016 to November 2017, at least 514,610 Syrians were ‘apprehended’ by the Turkish armed forces. However, since people returning or leaving the country west-bound are not recorded, neither the net flow nor the actual population of Syrians in Turkey can be determined for certain. Movements fluctuate greatly, from a high of 54,610 in September 2016 to a low of 18,876 in March 2017 and another high of 59,339 in October 2017.

These fluctuations coincide with the various political developments in the region. Already in March and April 2016, HRW (2016) reported that ‘Turkish border guards used violence against Syrian asylum seekers and smugglers, killing five people, including a child’. From summer 2016, when the EU-Turkey statement came into forces aiming to stop migration to the EU Turkey also began preventing refugees’ access to its territory. Notably, from around September, it began constructing a wall along the Syrian border (DW 2017). Work commenced in the Hatay region near Itlib and Aleppo. By February 2017, half the wall was operational; in the same period, refugee migration had more than halved. However, from July 2017, when the allied offensive on Isis-held Raqqa began displacement increased once more. In autumn 2017 it culminated due to combined Assad and Russian attacks on Gouta and Itlib. In January, Turkey started an invasion of the Afir region of Syria. Whilst the aim of the offensive is to fight the Kurdish YPG it de facto targets an area already full of refugees. This military intervention sandwiches hundreds of thousands of Syrians between ISIS, the Syrian/Russian forces and the Turkish army.

Due to the militarisation and successive fortification of the Turkish border 336 refugees lost their lives by the end of 2017. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR 2017) suggests that they were mostly killed by Turkish border guards (army and gendarmery). Many more were maltreated and thousands refouled. If numbers are accurate, this means that eight times more were killed on the Turkish border than people drowned on the Eastern Mediterranean Sea route. Testimonies received by SOHR suggests that violence against Syrians is deliberately used as a deterrence. By January 2018, 247,000 refugees were amassing and got stuck at the north-eastern region of Syria near the Hatay borders (HRW 2018). Simultaneously, Turkey also restricts the mobility of Syrians within the country who must now obtain permission for travelling to another city/province but will still only be allowed to do so for two weeks (RFS 2018).

Conclusion

The figures on the Syria-Turkish situation are incomplete. Notably the figure of Syrians in Turkey is likely to be exaggerated. Instead an image is created with regards to Turkey’s response to the refugee crisis that is probably more positive than reality.

In conjunction with the EU-Turkey statement and when it became clear that Syrians would no longer be able to just pass through Turkey the government began to also closing its borders. As a result many refugees got trapped within Syria where they are exposed to violence.

Whilst many Syrian refugees still seem to be able to escape to Turkey many others are denied international protection.

The Turkish claim of an open border policy for refugees, unfortunately, is no longer true. Instead, Turkey’s response to the refugee crisis becomes increasingly inconsistent and erratic.

References

DW (2017), Turkey builds more than half of Syrian border wall, http://www.dw.com/en/turkey-builds-more-than-half-of-syrian-border-wall/a-37723820

HRW (2018), Turkey/Syria: border guards shoot, block fleeing Syrians, 3/2/2018, https://www.hrw.org/news/2018/02/03/turkey/syria-border-guards-shoot-block-fleeing-syrians

HRW (2016), Turkey: Border Guards Kill and Injure Asylum Seekers Border Lock-Down Puts Syrian Lives at Risk, 10/5/2016, https://www.hrw.org/news/2016/05/10/turkey-border-guards-kill-and-injure-asylum-seekers

Mixed Migration Platform (diverse years), Monthly Summary, diverse reports, http://mixedmigrationplatform.org/pub-country/turkey/

RFS (2018), Syrians need permission to travel In Turkey, 5/1/2018, https://rfsmediaoffice.com/en/2018/01/05/syrians-need-permission-travel-turkey/

SOHR (2017), A new casualty by the Turkish border guards in an attempt to cross the border line, 17/11/2017, http://www.syriahr.com/en/?p=78799

In the UK ‘illegal migration’ is high on the list of public and policy concerns. In the British media, ‘illegal’ has been the top most often used term when reporting about immigrants (30 %, trend decreasing) (Migration Observatory 2016). ‘Illegal migrants’ are usually associated with ‘the others’ and thought of, for instance, as Indians, Brazilians or Albanians. The media would typically report matters like ‘the nation with the highest number of [detected] illegal workers in Britain was Bangladesh, at 3,574. There were 3,568 illegal workers from Pakistan; 2,782 from India; 1,310 Chinese; and 458 Nigerians. Other nationalities working illegally in large numbers include Albanians, Turks and Ukrainians’ (e.g. The Times 2016).

Meanwhile, it is usually overlooked that in other countries it is actually British nationals who too violate immigration law and stay as ‘illegal immigrants’. In the United States, British nationals were found to be the sixth largest nationality of visa overstayers, 18,950 in 2015, whilst Indians came only ninth (Department for Homeland Security 2016). In Australia, the media identified Brits as fourth largest nationality of visa overstayers ranking after Chinese, Malaysians and US Americans and even before Indians (Sydney Morning Herald 2014). They represented 3,786 or 6 % of the total. The media reported, ‘There are enough illegal immigrants living in Australia to populate a large regional city. [They are] hiding illegally in the community. …the biggest groups of illegals are Chinese, American, Malaysian, British and South Korean’ (The Courier Mail 2011). And in New Zealand, British nationals are recognised as fifth largest group of visa overstayers, 495 in January 2016 (New Zealand Immigration 2016) ranking before China or Brazil. No figures could be found for Canada, another popular destination for British migrants. And in Turkey, British nationals have for long resided in an irregular fashion in significant numbers exploiting an inconsistency in the migration legislation that allowed them to leave and re-enter the country in order to obtain a fresh visa (own observation) (the law changed in 2014 so that this practice is now longer possible).

This demonstrates that violating immigration legislation is not limited to certain nationalities; instead, Brits abroad may do more or less the same. It also illustrates some element of reciprocity as some of the countries of origin of irregular migration in the UK themselves host irregular Brits. Could this maybe encourage to reconsidering the issue of irregular migration or to discuss the policy implications?

Franck Duvell

The idea of brain drain is haunted by some fundamental methodological and conceptual problems; it is also deeply emotional and highly politicised and as such distorts and misguides research and analysis. Reference to brain gain, because it only emphasises the costs of emigration, assigns a negative connotation to human mobility. Even more so, because it puts the blame on the individual who is in search for a better life and singles out the individual as opposed to the state.

In contrast, historical studies have demonstrated that the mobility of brains contributed a great deal to the expansion of knowledge; often, it was the concentration of brains that lead to the critical mass required to trigger progress. For instance, in the novel ‘The Physician’ (Gordon 1986) an Englishmen with an urge for more knowledge that could not be satisfied in Medieval Britain travels to Isfahan in Iran, then the centre of knowledge, to learn his trade. He found himself in the company of hundreds of learners from many parts of the world creating a hub of knowledge expanding the boundaries of science. Similarly, during that time, the best architects and builders from anywhere in the world travelled to work on the then major constructions sites creating cathedrals and what not which are now praised as some of the greatest structures humanity has created (Hoerder 2002). They learned from one another and once the job was done move on and applied their expertise at other projects. Nowadays, we discuss the migration of Greek medical doctors to Germany, or of European mathematicians to the US hence circulation of brains as brain drain. These two examples illustrate that the analysis of the mobility of brains can bring about two contrasting results, that brain mobility can be either beneficial or disadvantageous. However, in order to provide for a more compete matrix of costs benefits we can apply two entirely different lines of analysis.

First, we analyse the effects of circulation of brains from the perspective the brains.  One the one hand, we find that the mobility of brains leads to the acquisition of experience and new knowledge and thus enhances the brain, a phenomenon labelled as brain gain (Stark et al. 1997). It also enhances revenues for the brain, hence facilitates better pay. On the other hand, key disadvantages identified are related to skilled migrants employed well below their skills level. This labelled as brain waste (Schiff and Ozden 2005); it also entails that the revenues for the individuals are well below their potential revenues would they have worked in their profession. However, the individual, even if working below his/her potential may well earn higher revenues and even afford a higher living standard than in the country of origin. There might thus still be some gain for individual migrant.

Second, we can analyse the circulation of brains from the perspective of the nation states which the brain leaves or move to. On the one hand, the emigration of brain is occasionally understood as a loss of brain for the country of origin or a ‘brain drain’ (e.g. Adams 1968). But if a country can’t afford paying the brain and the brain remains idle it is rather wasted. However, Bhagwati and Hamada (1974) argued that the emigration of brain as at least in part compensated by the remittances people send back home. Some countries deliberately produce an oversupply of certain skills, then the brain rather becomes a commodity for export. On the other hand, the immigration of skilled individuals is usually a brain gain for the destination country, even if underutilised. Meanwhile, Caplan (1997) discusses how to utilise for national development what he calls the intellectual Diaspora. Notably, the return of skilled migrants to the country of origin has become known as brain exchange (e.g. Straubhaar 2000); in that case, new skills have been acquired, this accounts for another case of brain gain, this time for the country of origin. The literature on return migration (see Cassarino 2004) the extent to which this contributes to development emphasises the importance of the time dimension of the mobility or brains and the impacts this can have.

This brief discussion illustrates that the mobility of brains has rather mixed effects. Commencing analysis from a focus on the ‘brain drain’ effect is thus a fairly limited approach precluding the finding of potential, positive effects. Such a conceptualisation is also often based on a snapshot of matters in time and neglect possible long-term effects, notably those related to brain gain or brain return. Instead, it is the entire matrix of the costs and benefits on the sending and the receiving end of the affected countries as well as the individuals that should be acknowledged. The analysis of the effects of the mobility of brains only with respect to the effects for states, in particular the country of origin, because it only takes states as units of analysis is actually an expression of what has once been criticised by Wimmer and Glick-Schiller (2002) as methodological nationalism. To conclude, we should abstain from solely or primarily or first look at brain drain and instead apply a reframing approach and accordingly analyse migration of the highly skilled from diverse perspectives.

The constitutional reform in Turkey and the conditions under which it is pushed through brings back memories of the legal procedures by which the Nazis came to power in Germany in the 1930. In this blog, I will sketch some similarities and differences.

Ø  In Turkey, the person behind the constitutional reform is AK party founder president Erdogan and his hunger for power, in Nazi Germany it was Reich chancellor Hitler of the NSDAP. In Turkey, the parliament’s speaker is AK party member Kahraman, in Germany it was led by Nazi party member Göring; both ensured the parliament would comply with their leaders’ plans.

Ø  Turkey’s constitutional reform is prepared following an attempted military coup and the bombing of the parliament. President Erdogan declared state of emergency and since 21 July 2016 is largely governing through emergency decrees. The Nazi Enabling act was passed following an arson attack of the parliament, the so-called ‘Reichstagsbrand’.  President Hindenburg on advice of Hitler issued the ‘Reichstagsbrand decree’ and thus a state of emergency.

Ø  In Turkey, the post-coup emergency decrees were used to restrict civil rights, remove all opposition from post and ban critical media. In Germany, the ‘Reichstagsbrand decree’ lead to restricting civil rights, closed all opposition media and ‘was used as the legal basis for the imprisonment of anyone considered to be opponents of the Nazis’.

Ø  In Turkey, constitutional reforms require a two-third majority. The AK party ensures the outcome by intimidating the parliamentarian opposition; the leaders and MPs of the oppositional HDP were arrested. In Nazi Germany, the Enabling act depended upon a two-thirds majority vote in parliament, Hitler and the Nazi Party ensured the outcome by intimidation and persecution. The Communist party with its 81 MPs was banned and also 26 Social democratic MPs imprisoned.

Ø  In Turkey, the ruling AK party does not hold a parliamentarian majority and requires collaboration of the nationalist MHP. In Nazi Germany, the NSDAP needed the conservative Centre Party to fabricate a parliamentarian majority and in exchange offered certain concessions regarding the rights of Catholics.

Ø  In Turkey, the reform is put to the people for a referendum; in Nazi Germany there was no such procedure.

Ø  In Turkey, the reform will abolish the role of the prime minister, in Nazi Germany the role of the president (Hindenburg) was de facto abolished after Hindenburg died. In Turkey, the parliament continues to function though the president (Erdogan) will have the authority to annul Parliament and call for elections; in Nazi Germany, the parliament continues to exist though all opposition parties were banned.

Ø  In Turkey, the president can govern through decrees as well as emergency rule but requiring parliamentary approval; in Nazi Germany Hitler ruled through decrees though after the enabling act these needed no more approval, his leadership was less formal and based on the so-called leader principle (‘Führerprinzip’).

Ø  In Turkey, the president will appoint top state officials, ministers and thus the government; in Nazi Germany, the chancellor (Hitler) appointed top state officials and ministers.

Ø  In Turkey, the parliament retains powers to issue, amend or annul laws; in Nazi Germany, the Enabling act gave the cabinet and de facto Hitler the sole power to issue laws.

Ø  In Germany, the parliament was reduced to an advisory role; in Turkey, the parliament retained some power.

Ø  In Turkey, six of 13 constitutional judges were named by the president severely crippling its independence and powers; in Nazi Germany, the People’s Court (Volksgerichthof) was instituted by Hitler.

Ø  Crucially important in Nazi Germany was the coordination or alignment (‘Gleichschaltung’) of all state authorities through removing all non-Nazis like teachers, professors, judges or civil servants from public posts and intimidating the rest; in Turkey, the ongoing purge is doing exactly the same by sacking over 128,000 civil servants across many sectors (see TurkeyPurge).

Ø  In Turkey, the president (Erdogan) would simultaneously become head of ruling party, through this controls the parliament (legislative), government and state (executive); in Nazi Germany, Hitler was simultaneously head of ruling party, government and state.

The processes of these reforms and the conditions under which they take place are very similar though the reforms as such differ though whether this is a fundamental difference remains to be seen. Both Erdogan and Hitler were eager to give their politics the appearance of legality though this was achieved by manipulations of the procedures and oppression of the opposition. The Enabling act concentrated all executive powers with the cabinet and de facto Reich Chancellor Hitler; the Turkish constitutional reform concentrates all executive power with the president. Hence, from here, the comparison of the two processes of seizing absolute powers becomes more complex. The Nazi Enabling act removed all legislative powers from the parliament. In contrast, in the Turkish proposal the parliament continues to hold legislative powers. However, the president can rule through decrees and state of emergency whilst as member and possibly strong leader of the political party that holds parliamentarian also steers the legislation (see Oder in Aljazeera 2017). The Turkish constitutional reforms is not the same as the Nazi Enabling act; however, it seems the Turkish version of an Enabling act, just like the Enabling act enabling Hitler would enable Erdogan to de facto become sole and relatively unrestrained leader. Some hope is still provided by the forthcoming referendum, so matters are not yet decided.

Year after year, for many years we learn about record levels of refugees. Numbers climbed from 18 million in 1997 to now 65.3 million; from 2010 numbers were constantly rising. The largest crisis, which is the Syrian crisis, broke out in 2011. This is now over 5 years ago. It took the world's leaders over five year only to meet. During these five years several ten thousand people lost their lives and millions suffered enormously. For all of them the UN summit comes five years too late! And then it took the world’s leaders two days to decide that they are not going to change anything immediately. The waiting game continues. Few if any of the 65 million displaced persons will be offered a new home as a result of an international agreement. Once more it turned out there is no such thing as an 'international community'; instead there is only a gathering of individual leaders immersed in ideas of national interests; the result is not any kind of ‘community’ but rather disunity. Future history books will show that modern nation states first failed in 1938 to rescue the European Jews from the Nazis and again in 2016 to rescue Syrians from Assad, Putin and ISIS.

Refugees are mostly generated by undemocratic states or non-state actors but it seems that democratic states do little but talking to alleviate the situation. The failure of the UN summit to agree the rescue of refugees is also a failure of democracies, and because it is in particular liberal democracies it is also a failure of liberalism.

Further to this, the selfish refusal to rescue refugees discredits the idea of the nation state in its current form as a largely inhumane and deadly form of organisation.*

It is also the failure of the people in these countries who voted these leaders into power who rather let refugees suffer and die than come to their rescue. Subsequently, the failure is also the failure of each individual who votes such leaders into power. Everybody who votes for Trump, May, Orban, Kaczynski, LePen, Petri, Wilders, Dahl, etc is responsible for the death of Aylan Kurdi and the many others whose names we don't know.

The failure is thus also the failure of humanism and a stark reminder of the dark side of humans as 'each other's enemies' entangled in 'solitariness, poorness, nastiness, and brutishness' (Hobbes).

But maybe there is still hope, leaders pledged a compact by 2018 and it is for civil society to increase global pressure even more than they already do within societies and beyond on the global level.

According to the NATO's founding treaty, the Washington treaty 1949 NATO aims to 'settle any international dispute' (art 1), 'further development of peaceful and friendly international relations' (art 2) 'in such a manner that international peace and security and justice are not endangered' (art 1) to 'maintain and develop their individual and collective capacity to resist armed attack' (art 3, article 5 further elaborates on the issue of armed attacks). it is in this context that the following article (4) refers to 'the territorial integrity, political independence or security'. Greece and Turkey since 1951 are both members of the treaty (art 14). The Washington treaty also emphasis 'the Parties to this Treaty reaffirm their faith in the purposes and principles of the Charter of the United Nations' and thus indirectly adheres to 'universal respect for, and observance of human rights and fundamental freedoms' (art. 57 or Charter of United Nations) with then indirectly refers to the human rights convention and refugee rights convention.

The Washington treaty is (a) regulating international relations between states - of the members as well as between the members and third countries - and nothing else, and (b) is only meant to collectively 'resist armed attacks', no other cases are mentioned that should trigger action by NATO. Because the influx of refugees involves a non-state party, is affecting but not in itself an international relations affair because it does not involve two (or more) states, and is no armed attack - neither are refugees armed, nor is escaping hardship and war an armed attack - this falls outside the mandate of NATO and NATO should not get involved.

Further to this, facilitating migration (human smuggling) involves no state parties and is no armed attack, therefore addressing this phenomenon is not covered by the NATO treaty. Also because NATO is a military defense organisation NATO military resources are primarily designed for military deterrence or defense but not to deal with events that involve civilians. In other words, the armies and navies are by contract designed to deal with the armies and navies of other states.

In addition, NATO resources are not geared up for rescue operation. Warships may as part of their equipment have resources like helicopters, radar, dinghies and staff (soldiers) who can also rescue people. But the hulls of warships are usually too high to easily facilitate rescuing people and soldiers are not primarily trained in rescuing or looking after rescued people including refugees. For this purpose all countries have specialised rescue agencies.

Apart from the legal dimension, responding to a refugee crisis of historical proportions of people largely fleeing immediate threat from war or after displacement and destruction of their livelihoods and seeking to rebuild their lives somewhere else by sending the army with the aim 'to stem the flow' (The Independent 12/2/2016) is utterly inappropriate. An adequate response would be instead to sending humanitarian organisations and setting in motion humanitarian mechanisms including airlifts and resettlement measures. The army/navy is just not the type of organisation appropriate and military responses and not the type of appropriate responses to a humanitarian crisis.

The EU woke up late to the Syrian refugee crisis. In response to what already began in 2011 and is now perceived the Mediterranean migration crisis the EU finally erupted in hectic activities, and only once refugees began arriving in the EU in large numbers.

In September 2015, eleven so-called hotspots ‘where the EU needs to provide operational support to ensure that arriving migrants are registered, and to avoid that they move on to other Member States in an uncontrolled way’ (EC 29/9/2015) were planned. Such registration centres have been meant to regain control and thereby to slow down flows. Besides, in October Frontex declared to send 775 officers to the peripheral EU countries to enhance border controls (Frontex 4/12/2015). Frontex is expected to improve refugee registration, distinguish between refugees and migrants, and subsequently facilitate removal of the latter. Further to this, resettlement and relocation of refugees from EU and non-EU countries was announced. In May the EU proposed the relocation of 40,000 refugees, in September it proposed the relocation of 120,000 (EC 9/2015) bringing the total up to 160,000 (EC 22/9/2015). Also the resettlement of refugees from non-EU countries was prepared. Initial resettlement of 20,000 ‘persons in clear need of protection‘ (EC 22/7/2015) and the resettlement of up to 80,000 refugees annually from Turkey to the EU was recommended (EC 15/12/2015). This is meant to prevent irregular movements, address human smuggling and instead introduce regular migration channels. In addition, new forms of collaboration with Turkey, the main country of transit, were agreed. First, a Joint Action Plan was agreed followed by the Turkey Refugee Facility worth €3 billion (EC 24/11/2015). Immediately afterwards, on 30 November, Turkey demonstratively raided a couple of beaches and arrested 1,300 persons aiming to clandestinely travel to Greece. It was implied that this ‘crackdown operation just a day after the EU and Turkey reached a political deal to stem the flow of migrants to Europe’ signalled a tougher repressive approach (EUObserver 1/12/2015 ). Later that week it was reported that ‘2,944 migrants [were] detained in four days in Turkey’s west’ (Hurriyet 4/12/215). In Istanbul, the police began rounding up and arbitrarily detaining hundreds of Syrians every day (Reuters 27/12/2015). ‘According to consistent accounts by refugees and asylum-seekers, in September 2015 the Turkish authorities began …transporting them more than a thousand kilometres by bus to isolated detention centres’ (Amnesty International 12/2015). Also a ‘new comprehensive border protection unit’ is in the making (Hurriyet 19/12/2015). Finally, the border between Greece and Macedonia, the gateway to the Balkan route has been partially closed, notably to nationalities other than Syrians, Iraqis and Afghans (UNHCR 27/11/2015). Thus, a policy mix was agreed consisting of registering people on the move, increase controls, slow down flows, increase legal migration channels, contain larger numbers in Turkey and introduce more barriers along the route.

However, on 21 December, the NGO Lighthouse reported from Lesbos ‘the boats are still arriving at a steady pace in Skala and Kagia, with 12 boats arriving just this morning. …A big boat with 142 passengers had problems at sea last night’ (Lighthouse FB Page 21/12/2015). NGOs noticed that ‘smugglers in Turkey have changed their routes to avoid police-intervention. …The small island of Chios, just south of Lesbos, has seen a dramatic increase in refugee arrivals during the last 10 days’ (Starfish Foundation 12/12/2015); on 22 December local humanitarian volunteers from Chios reported ‘more boats continue to arrive. I've never experienced this many people arriving so quickly’ (Scott Swalling, FB, 22/12/2015), same for Leros, ‘having more arrivals than usual’ (Are you Syrious FB Page 23/12/2015). And from Lesbos volunteers write ’(21.12.15) about 70 boats arrived in north Lesvos and about 24 in south-east Lesvos’ (received by email, also see UNHCR 22/12/2015), on the following day a local volunteer (Kempson, YouTube 22/12/2015), reported the arrival of another 42 boats just in northern Lesbos. Due to new border controls by Macedonia and the refusal of Greek authorities to register non-Syrians on Lesbos migrants and refugees are prevented from moving on, around ‘3,000 people …were stranded at the border’ of Macedonia (MSF 21/12/2015) whilst ‘there are over 5,000 people now stuck’ in camp Moria on Lesbos (Sea of Solidarity 23/12/2015). Nevertheless, regularly, one, two or more trains a day arrive in Slovenia with a thousand or more refugees on board, reports read like ‘train with 1100 people left Slavonski Brod at 19.30 heading to Slovenia. There was an earlier train, around 15.00, same number of people, same destination’ (23/12/2015, see postings on MigRail FB page). In November 154,467 crossed the Aegean Sea to arrive in Greece. This is lower than in October but still the same level as in summer. Even by 20th December as still refugees have arrived, 83,300 as in the whole of July (78,000) (UNHCR 24/12/2015). Unfortunately, also maritime accidents as well as cases of have increased due to cold weather conditions. ‘Not least due to the EU-enforced presence of Turkish police forces at the coast, travellers are forced to take ever lengthier and dangerous routes, like for instance in the direction of the Greek island of Farmakonisi where most of last weeks’ shipwrecks occurred’ the Alarm Phone argues (Alarm Phone, weekly report, 24/12/2015). In any case, this illustrates that the Aegean and the Balkan routes are as busy as previously.

How can this mismatch between policy announcements of repressing migration and the continuous flow of refugees be explained?

By 21 December, only four of the planned 11 ‘hotspots’ were implemented, three were only partially functional and only one was fully functional with 137 staff it seems (EC 21/12/2015). By December 2015, only 477 of the projected 775 Frontex officers were deployed to Greece to support the country in controlling its borders with Turkey (Frontex 4/12/2015). This means that the EU member states are slow or even hesitant in providing the officers requested. Later, it was even reported that ‘the situation in Moria [reception camp and hot spot on Lesbos] is very difficult since the staff of Frontex that help the Greek authorities in their work [have] departing from Lesvos because of Christmas’ (Lesbos News 21/12/2015). Also efforts by Serbia and Macedonia and later Greece to profile and filter migrants and refugees and thus halt the migration of certain nationalities did not diminish the flow because around 90 percent of the people are from Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq and these are still permitted to pass (UNHCR 22/12/2015). Meanwhile, resettlement plans only resulted ‘in only 208 people actually being moved’ whilst the relocation plans of refugees from Turkey to the EU have ‘stalled’ (Financial Time 17/12/2015). This demonstrates that EU member states are unwilling to implement EU policies and legally admit refugees who therefore (have to) continue traveling on their own account. Also the enforcement operations in Turkey perceived and presented as a new tough approach were actually nothing new; coast and gendarmerie have been relentless all year round in apprehending people suspected of aiming to cross borders without authorisation (see my FB entry 18/10/2015). The effect of detaining a hundred or so people a day (Reuters 27/12/2015) is actually minimal but the horrors this causes are significant. Indeed, Turkey has been accused of increasingly arbitrary and brutal measures like holding migrants and refugees in ‘prolonged detention, denied all communication with the outside world and in some cases forcibly returned to their home countries, in violation of Turkish and international law’ (Amnesty International 12/2015). And the new border security force that is mentioned in the news has actually been in the making for years in form of the Bureau for Integrated Border Management (since 2008) (European Commission 2008) but merging the diverse agencies with their divergent mandates under military and civilian governance so far proved an unsurmountable problem. Turkey responds by repression, this is what they can do best, it is an authoritarian state with a tradition of police brutality; but whilst it will not be able to effectively control the movements of such large numbers of people it will inevitably get entangled in more human rights violations. In any case, no measure or operation had stopped the flow of people, neither in summer nor from November when additional measures were enforced. Meanwhile, Turkey continues to be preoccupied with the security on its border with Syria and Iraq and fresh confrontations in the Kurdish areas which now almost amount to civil war or even war (The Telegraph 20/12/2015). Whatever the declaration might be the protection of its western borders is of only secondary concern. Finally, there no signs of any improvement in Syria, Afghanistan or Iraq, rather the opposite the Russian intervention in Syria further aggravated conditions. Also are there hardly any signs that Turkey is granting more rights or a more stable status to refugees or offer better socio-economic conditions and thus addressing the root causes of onward migration. Thus, the determinants of migration were neither addressed nor have they been diminished, therefore a German newspaper concluded ‘most only want to leave’ (Die Zeit 23/12/2015).

Five tentative conclusions can be drawn from this: (1) policy announcements are either not or only partially implemented, (2) some announcements appear to be mere policy narratives aiming at and appeasing the public rather than meant to be enforced, (3) several policy response have unintended side-effects and result in refugee and human rights violations, and (4) whilst primary and secondary root causes persist (5) despair and human agency of refugees and migrants with international law on their side and supported by significant civil society structures so far prevail.

The EU is now preparing a war on smugglers. On 12 May 2015 the EU’s Foreign Affairs Council discussed a background paper on measures in the ‘Southern Central Mediterranean region [and] the main route for migrant flows into Europes’. This demonstrates that the main aim is to close the route for migrants and refugees by targeting the infrastructures and facilitators along this route. The paper suggests ‘persistent surveillance’, ‘board and search’, ‘seizure’, and ‘destruct vessels’ by deploying ‘special forces units’; it also acknowledged the ‘high risk of collateral damage including the loss of life’. ‘Collateral damage’ is synonym for the loss of lives of civilians, in other words migrants and refugees. Subsequently, the Council of the European Union (2015) decided to launch a ‘military operation in the Southern Central Mediterranean’ (EUNAVFOR MED). The deployment of the army turns this into a war-like intervention and the attack on ships and other infrastructures, the possible loss of civilian lives this involves and the subsequent the closing down of a migration and escape route reveals that the ‘war on smugglers’ (Statewatch 2015) is de facto a ‘war on migrants and refugees’.

 This is not without precedence:

In summer 1947 and in early 1948, the British secret service sabotaged and attacked refugee ships in Italian ports, destroyed one and damaged at least two others to prevent their departure and to taking  Jewish refugees to Palestine (Jeffery 2010).

On 17 July 1947, British soldiers forcefully boarded the famous vessel ‘Exodus’ with over 4,500 Holocaust survivors on board, 3 people were shot, one crew member and two refugees, and the ship forcefully returned to France where it came from (Wikipedia).

On 12 December 1941, the motor vessel ‘Struma’ left Romania with 769 Jews on board escaping the Holocaust, Turkey refused to admit them and sent the ship back on 23 February 1942. The next day the ship was shot and sunk by assumingly a Soviet naval vessel, all but one refugee died (Jewish Virtual Library).

On 5 August 1944, the motor vessel ‘Mefkure’ with over 300 Jewish refugees from Romania and Hungary was sunk from gunfire by a Soviet submarine, other sources by a German gunboat; survivors in the sea were gunned down and killed, only five survived (King 2014).

During the 1930s and 1940s, ships carrying Jews, Jewish refugees and Holocaust survivors from Europe to Palestine and elsewhere where conventionally depicted as ‘illegal immigrant ships’. The passengers were either lacking German exit visa and/or British or other entry visa and therefore legally constructed as ‘illegal immigrants’. Between 1934 and 1948, ‘illegal immigrant ships’ made their way to Palestine carrying more than 100,000 people; some 2,000 of those passengers drowned before reaching their destination (Haaretz 2012).

 Now and then

In the 1930 and 1940s, Jewish refugees where either not allowed to leave, they were required exit visa and/or  not allowed to enter, neither the US, Turkey, a transit country, nor Palestine, an important destination and were usually labelled ‘illegal immigrants’ and their vessels as ‘illegal immigrants ships’ (e.g. Ofer 1991). Again, today refugees from Syria Eritrea, Sudan and elsewhere cannot obtain visa and are thus legally constructed as ‘illegal immigrants’ when tuning up on the shores of the EU.

The current EU proposals for overseas reception, detention and processing centre or the Australian practice of placing refugees on prison islands like Nauru or Christmas island partly recall the British politics to stop Jewish refugees from reaching their destination and instead detaining them on Cyprus (Yad Vashem).

The ships that carry them are often overloaded and unsafe for purpose, just like under the crisis conditions in the 1930s and 1940s. For instance, the Struma was described as ‘in poor shape even before it set sail from Constanta. It had originally served to transport cattle along the Danube River, and was not supposed to carry more than 100 passengers. Sanitary and safety conditions on board were also atrocious’ (Haaretz 2010). And today, again the boats are reported to be ‘unsafe and overcrowded’ (The Independent 2015).

Some of the arguments used today reassemble the arguments used in the 1930s. For instance, in 1941, when the Struma was turned away the British Colonial Secretary Lord Moyne warned there could be Nazi agents amongst the refugees, therefore Jewish refugees should be refused entry and returned to ‘preventing the influx of Nazi agents under the cloak of refugees’ (see Eretz Yisroel). And in 2015, there were reports of ‘fears that militants might try to infiltrate migrant boats’ (The Guardian, 18/2/2015) and claims were made that ‘Isis militants travel to Europe disguised as Syrian refugees’ (International Business Times, 30/1/2015). In 1941 and in 2015, these were equally unfounded but fuelled the moral panic and justified harsh responses.

This shows that some of the politics and discourses applied in the 1930s and 1940s are again applied like constructing the as illegal immigrants, claiming that refugee ships are infiltrated by agents respectively terrorists, preventing refugees from leaving, destroying their ships before departure, deploying the army and navy to stop the influx, sinking ships at sea, refusing refugees entry and turning them back.

Never again!?

This imperative derived from the lessons learned from the Holocaust and the failure to rescue the European Jews has now been relinquished it seems. Are we now back at the moral state of the 1930s were unwanted populations are removed from the ‘realm of moral subjects’ (Bauman 1996) and killed or left to die and the needy are turned away and refused shelter? It occurs to me that the moral panic over immigration, foreigners and refugees, over illegal immigrants, that xenophobia and racism, the feelings of being overwhelmed by too many are similar to the moral panic in the 1930s and 1940s when the international community decided at the conferences of Evian (1938), Bermuda (1944) not to rescue the European Jews, when the refugee ship St Louise was turned away by Cuba and the US and send back to Europe were several hundred of the refugees were eventually killed in concentration camps or the war.

References

Bauman Zygmund (1996), Gewalt – modern und postmodern, in Miller M, Soeffner HG (eds), Modernität und Barbarei, Frankfurt: Suhrkamp, 36–67

Etez Yisroel (undated), The Struma & The unmitigated policy of the British against Jewish refugees fleeing Hitler's war against them, http://www.eretzyisroel.org/~jkatz/struma.html

Haaretz (2012), The lone survivor of a Jewish refugee ship, Haaretz, 24/2/2012, http://www.haaretz.com/weekend/week-s-end/the-lone-survivor-of-a-jewish-refugee-ship-1.414588

Independent, The (2015), Migrant boat disaster: Captain charged with killing passengers by ramming vessel into ship, 21/4/2015, http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/migrant-boat-disaster-captain-charged-with-killing-passengers-by-ramming-vessel-into-ship-10192649.html

Jeffery, Keith (2010), MI6: The History of the Secret Intelligence Service 1909-1949, Bloomsbury

King, Charles (2014), Refugees of the Bosphorus, Slate 24/9/2014, http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/history/2014/09/how_ira_hirschmann_and_the_future_pope_john_xxiii_ushered_jewish_refugees.html

Ofer, Dalia (1991), Escaping the Holocaust, Oxford: OUP, http://jewishtraces.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/OXFORDJOURNAL.pdf

Council of the European Union (2015), Council decision 2o15/778 on a European Union military operation in the Southern Central Mediterranean (EUNAVFOR MED), http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=OJ:JOL_2015_122_R_0004&from=EN

Jewish Virtual Library (undated), Immigration to Israel: "Struma" Illegal Immigration Ship, http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/History/struma.html

Peers, Steve (2015), The EU’s Planned War on Smugglers, http://www.statewatch.org/analyses/no-268-eu-war-on-smugglers.pdf.

Wikipedia (undated), SS Exodus, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_Exodus

Foreign fighters: time to recognise and study a new type of migration | The COMPAS Blog

On 30 October 2014, the Washington Post reported the flow of over 15,000 foreigner fighters to Syria and probably also to Iraq. They suggested that each month around 1,000 people travel to Syria, mostly with the intention to join the fights, and thus to join the killing. A map shows the countries where these people have been coming from and their numbers: Tunisia (3,000), Saudia Arabia (2,500), Jordan (2,089), Morocco (1,500), Lebanon (890), (Russia (800), Libya (556), UK (488), France (412), Turkey (400), Egypt (358), Pakistan (330), Belgium (296), Algeria (250), Australia (250), Germany (240) (Washington Post). About 5,000 came from the Middle East, another 5,000 from Northern Africa and 3,200 from Western and Northern countries. In total, 53 countries are listed, suggesting a global phenomenon.

This information is based on sources from the CIA, the International Centre for the Study of Radicalization and the Soufan Group research (2014). How accurate these figures are is certainly disputable, national estimates are sometimes higher. For instance, German sources refer to ‘at least 600’ (Der Stern 16/1/2015), and French sources to 930, people who went to Syria and Iraq (RFLRL 25/1/2015). A related feature is the return of fighters to the countries where they have been coming from. The returnees may be disillusioned and they may be traumatised but they may also be radicalised and aiming at taking the fight back to the perceived enemy countries in the west. In the UK ‘about 250 are believed to have returned’ (BBC News, 14/11/2014), in Germany, their number is put at 200 (Der Stern 16/1/2015).

However, foreign fighters in Syria and Iraq are not isolated occurrences; foreigners also join fights in other parts of the world. Most notably, in Ukraine, Russians and other nationalities are joining the separatists to fight against the Ukrainian central government (BBC News 1/9/2014). Foreign fighters are also reported from the conflicts in Libya (All Africa 6/1/2015). The current situation is not new.,In the recent past volunteers have joined foreign guerrillas and fights in other countries, like in the 1980s and 1990 in Nicaragua, El Salvador, Palestine and Kurdistan, and more recently in Afghanistan and Chechnya. For instance, some German leftists joined the PLO or PFLP, the PKK or the Sandinistas and FMLN and others. Most of these, however, were individual cases and there was no large scale trend. Historically there are numerous cases of volunteers and mercenaries joining fights like French and Germans who joined the American independence forces.

Ideologies and drivers

Past and present volunteers, and this does not include mercenaries, usually joined forces they considered in one way or another anti-establishment, anti-western, anti-imperialist, revolutionary and often nationalist, and saw them as liberating countries from dominant powers of either foreign origin, foreign backed and/or illegitimate national elites. In any case they claim(ed) that they are practicing international solidarity and join(ed) a just cause. However, the volunteers of the past seemed to have been rather driven by ideals of equality, freedom, modernity and progress whereas the volunteers of today are driven by ideals of gender inequality, repression of other religions and of nostalgia, retreat and radical conservatism (see El-Mafaalani’s study on the motives of youth joining Salafist movements, Die Sueddeutsche 24/1/2015, also see the Soufan Group 2014 report). This implies that the purpose of these foreign fighters – supporting a community/movement/country under attack and/or joining the fighting – may have been similar whereas the motives and ideals – joining liberal versus joining illiberal causes – seem rather different. In this context, the rise of the number of mostly young people from western countries joining this cause indicates some failure of humanitarian and liberal education.

Staying the trend

The impact on the affected countries, the countries of origin and return, the countries of destination and potentially also transit countries is significant. The foreign fighters are radicalised in the countries of origin, their journeys are facilitated in transit countries where they possibly have supporters, and their contribution to the fighting and to suicide bombings but also to propaganda and infrastructure seems significant given their sheer numbers, whereas their return to the countries of origin can pose significant risks. The measures discussed so far are to improve border controls in all three types of countries: to introduce watch lists and prevent people from entering transit countries (so far, 1,300 were refused entry to Turkey, interview with Turkish official), remove the passports of people who are suspected to wanting to join IS in order to prevent them from travelling in the first place or to ban them from returning (The Guardian, 14/11/2014) and to criminalise recruiting, training, funding and travelling for the purpose of fighting abroad (see Council of Europe’s Committee on Foreign Terrorist Fighters and Related Issues, 22/1/2015). There are, however, legal and normative challenges to all of these as the Guardian article suggests (as above).

Integration into the migration debate

On 8 October, I participated in the 'International Academic and Political Conference "Brain drain and brain gain: world context and Ukrainian reality"' at International Institute for Education, Culture and Diaspora Relations, Polytechnic University, Lviv, Ukraine (see MIOK 2014, http://miok.lviv.ua/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1229:i-qbrain-drain-brain-gain-q-2014-&catid=15:2010-03-10-15-49-51&Itemid=63.

This was probably the first time that in Ukraine migration, emigration and Diasporas have been discussed in positive terms. So far, emigration was mostly depicted as a problem, a national security issue, as people deserting their country and only the negative consequences were highlighted such as the break-up of families whilst remittances were sometimes discredited as ‘easy money’. At this occasion, however, the minister for education Sergej Kvit, the chair of the parliament’s human rights committee Patskan, a local politician as well as a businessman, Vervega from SoftServe and most of the academics (e.g. Kliutchkovska. Malinovska, Sadova, Lapshyna) described migration as a source of inspiration, investments and development. In the ensuing discussion it was acknowledged that there is not just ‘brain drain’ but also ‘brain gain’, that through migration countries and its people network to their mutual advantage, that Ukraine requires the experiences of its Diasporas and that the country should now reach out to these and improve conditions in the country to facilitate Diaspora activities as well as return migration.

Already in his electoral programme the now president of Ukraine Poroshenko promised to promote the rights of Ukrainians abroad and setting up a Diaspora politics programme (http://meest-online.com/ukraine/policy/peredvyborcha-prohrama-petra-poroshenka/). In September 2014, Poroshenko in a meeting with the Ukrainian Congress in Canada explained that the Ukrainian parliament will pay greater attention to Ukrainian Diaspora (President 2014, http://www.president.gov.ua/news/31247.html). One of the first steps taken addressed voting rights of Ukrainians abroad and in September 2014, a new bill ‘On amendments to legislative acts of Ukraine re-ensuring electoral rights of Ukrainian citizens abroad’ (Reg. No. 4595) was prepared. In the following, measures were discussed regarding the mobilization of Ukrainians abroad, an estimated 500,000 to over 2 million, for the upcoming parliamentary elections in October (Verkhovna Rada [Parliament] 2014, http://rada.gov.ua/en/news/News/News/97531.html).

In recent days, it was reported that a hundred or so migrants stormed into the port of Calais and chased by the police whilst aiming to get on board of one of the ferries to the UK. Day and night they also try getting into the back of lorries bound for the UK. They held demonstrations in town to protest for humane treatment. In response, police is send in to protect the port, destroy the ramshackle tents and evict the squats where they were staying. There are said to be around 1,200 mostly refugees, a significant increase from previous months when there have been probably around 400. French politicians and media depict this is sort of a crisis with negative impact on the hauliers, the functioning of the port, and the lives of some people in Calais and thus as a security and policing issue. But is that in adequate characterisation of the case? 

This situation in Calais must be understood within the context of the arrival of around 50,000 refugees and migrants by boat from Libya in Italy so far this year; 1.889 have this year lost their lives on the sea. Frontex claims that in total, around 150,000 people were so far apprehended on the external borders of the EU (http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2014/sep/05/europe-migrant-influx-illegal-border-crossings), though this seems to contradict other lower numbers. This in turn is related to the probably 12 million refugees in the neighbourhood of the EU, the 9.5 million Syrians, 0.8 million Iraqis, up to one million Ukrainians, several ten thousand Libyans and large numbers of Somalis, Sudanese, Eritreans and Malians. This figure does not include the 5 million refugees Egypt claims to host (http://allafrica.com/stories/201409070011.html). Two thirds are displaced within their countries; about one third, around at least 4 million fled to mostly neighbouring countries, like Lebanon, Turkey, Jordan, Libya or Russia whilst a small proportion seeks shelter in the EU. Almost half of the neighbourhood of the EU is in flames which leads to a humanitarian crisis of enormous proportions. This year, the global refugee population could reach record levels, around 51 million, UNHCR warns.

But refugees don’t want to be refugees, they want to go back home as soon as possible, so they rather stay somewhere in the country or region and move just across the border to a neighbouring country. Only a very small minority seeks shelter in more distant countries, and often only after years in limbo, after they have given up hope that matters in their home country would improve in the foreseeable future and after the suffering of wives, families, and children have become too much. Hence, often only those who had enough spending months or years in some tents in Lebanon or Turkey and who concluded that they must rebuild their lives somewhere else, and who have the financial resources, and some contacts in other countries and skills finally leave the region and move to more distant countries.

Nevertheless, there is almost no legal way, no visa for refugees to reach Europe and they can only do so without prior authorisation. The only alternative to this are refugee resettlement programmes. The UNHCR urges the EU to accept at least 100,000 refugees. But so far the EU member states agreed to regularly resettle only 31,000, all Syrians (http://www.unhcr.org/53bfcd969.html). The overwhelming majority is accepted by Germany and Sweden. The UK only agreed to take 500 Syrians - the ‘most vulnerable’ as explained in the press - but has so far resettled a mere 50 or so, 50 out of 3 million Syrians!

Therefore, refugees have no other option but to crossing borders illegally, across the land borders if they come from or through the East or South East, or by boat if they come from the South. Therefore, the peripheral countries of the EU for long experience sometimes significant levels of irregular arrivals. Current levels are so far far close to previous highs, like in the mid 2000, but could reach record levels by the end of the year. In any case, the Italian asylum system is overwhelmed; the same applies to Greece and Bulgaria and conditions in Hungary are not any better. Access to asylum procedures can be an issue, there is a lack of adequate reception facilities, people may be forced to sleep rough, there are insufficient benefits or integration measures and few jobs so that people cannot support themselves either. Also maltreatment and racism are frequently bemoaned.

However, so far there is no regular system for the internal dispersal of refugees within the EU to other member states, little ‘solidarity’ with the peripheral member states or ‘burden sharing’ to use some of the concepts floating on the EU policy stage. Therefore, migrants and refugees are basically left with no other option than to take matters into their own hands and quasi disperse themselves across the EU. They mostly go to Germany, Austria, the Netherlands, Belgium, Sweden and Denmark, whilst some try to get to the UK, and these are people we currently see in Calais. So the somewhat chaotic scenes we have seen there are related to the absence of an orderly system of dispersal; and the UK by refusing to resettle refugees and by rejecting any coherent EU approach is contributing to this situation to no small extent.

So far this year, around 330,000 refugees made it to one of 28 member states the EU (the usual annual average is 250,000), and filed an asylum application. That equals 2.5 percent of the total refugee population in the region. Germany, Italy, Greece, Sweden and Bulgaria receive the largest numbers. But if we compare this with the 1.1 million Syrians which Turkey received the EU is under much less pressure. One can calculate that the UK received about 18,000 asylum applications, that is 5.45 percent of the total and less than Germany received in just one month, in July, 19,431.

Finally, it is frequently critically discussed why migrants and refugees chose going to specific countries. Notably the British public holds the belief that the country is overwhelmed, that migrants and refugees chose the UK because it is considered a ‘soft touch’ and because of the attraction of UK benefits. This then leads to the media and others blaming politicians for not doing enough to prevent this from happening. The above, however, demonstrates that the UK is actually receiving proportionally fewer refugees than other EU member state and only a very small proportion of the total population of concern.

In any case, migrants and refugees usually chose specific countries for very specific reasons. One of the strongest reasons usually is that they have relatives or friends in that country who would help them after arrival, this is the so-called network effect. Other strong reasons are migrant and refugee communities, a Diaspora and/or branches of opposition organisations. Language skills maybe another good reason, if peoples’ only foreign language is English, but they don’t know Italian, German or Danish, the UK is an obvious choice. Finally, the UK has a top reputation in the world for democracy, equality and economic power and people hope that there will be a place in society for them too to re-build their lives. And last but not least, compared to where they often come from – like the hell of Syria or ruined Somalia - the UK even if facing some hardship still seems the better option...

According to the latest (yet unpublished) Frontex figures around 25,000 irregular immigrants have crossed the Central Mediterranean during the first quarter of this year and mostly arrived in Italy; another 19,000 are said to have arrived by the end of May. Hence, a total of almost 45,000 people have within five month have arrived in Southern Europe; in this context it must be recognised that most are actually refugees who will apply for asylum and thus regularise their status. Frontex now argues that irregular migration increased by 25 times from 1,100 in the first quarter of 2013 to 25,000 in the same period in 2014 and concludes that this is vast. However, in order to understand and assess this figure it has to be contextualised and put into perspective.

First, it must to be recalled that due to the economic crisis in the EU international and in particular irregular migration was down because there was little demand for workers and there were less funds to pay for peoples’ journeys. In addition, the civil war in Libya and its aftermath had blocked an important route for irregular immigrants and refugees. Last year’s number of 73,000 arrivals was exceptionally low. Irregular immigration has been fluctuating from 73,000 in 2013, that’s the lowest number so far, and 150 or 160,000 which we saw in 2003 or 2004. So the 25,000 we saw in the first quarter of this year is actually still within the usual span of the annual influx.

Second, this rise from 2013 to 2014 can also be explained with the fact that the economic crisis is now over and that we are on the road of recovery meaning there are more jobs again and immigrants in Europe are able to again send money to their relatives and friends. Simultaneously, the Libya route is open again which enables to people to use this again. And because people aspiring and having to migrate have been in the waiting for quite some years there are more coming at the same time now. On the other hand, another important route, that through Turkey has been partly closed due to enhanced controls in Greece. So whilst people do not only start coming again, and arrive simultaneously, also more people use the Libyan route because all other routes are almost barred. Hence, the rise along the Central Mediterranean probably coincides with a drop numbers along the Aegean route though we haven’t seen the latest figures yet.

Third, we also have to consider the significant humanitarian crises in the vicinity of Europe which affects tens of millions of people, the crisis in Syria, there are at least 2.5 million refugees, the unhappy aftermath of the Arab spring like the military coup in Egypt, the failing state in Libya and the lack of improvements in Tunisia as well as the conflicts in Ukraine, Nigeria, Mali, Sudan not to forget the state of insecurity in Iraq, Afghanistan and Somalia or the dictatorship in Eritrea. In this light one might instead wonder why only so few seek shelter in Europe and that so many still put up even with the worst conditions.

Fourth, whilst it is true that Italy receives most these people many either await the outcome of their asylum claims - and recognition rates are higher than in most other EU countries - and then travel with their Italian documents to other countries. Though they are only permitted to stay but not to work there for up to 90 days which leads to some kind of a ping pong. Or they avoid being registered and finger-printed and move on irregularly. Italy provides little assistance and few opportunities to new arrivals and refugees and many are destitute and staying is no option. Unfortunately, however, there is no consensus in the EU to practice some solidarity with the peripheral EU member states, such as Italy or take a humane approach to the plight of the refugees and, for instance, disperse people across the member states. If, for instance, the EU would disperse the 25,000 arrivals of the first three of 2014 across all 28 EU member states this would on average mean less than 900 per country; this can hardly be considered a significant burden.

The crisis in Ukraine has already displaced thousands of people. Internal displacement has initially been reported mostly from Crimea and after the annexation by Russia but increasingly also from the Eastern provinces. For instance, 2,000 Crimeans are said to have already arrived in the western Ukrainian city Lviv (Economist 2014). Another 550 have arrived from Donets and Luhansk and by the end of may a further 500 IDPs are expected from Sloviansk, mostly women with children will be accommodated by the city council (Ukrainian Prawda). Also in Kiev there are an estimated 8,000 internal refugees from Crimea as well as others from Luhansk ( 24TV 2014). Ukrainian news sources (radio, 9/5) also reported significant further internal displacement from Mariupol and Sloviansk. The Border Monitoring project Ukraine (BMPU) reports (14/5/2014) the registration of 127 displaced person in Zakarpattya, they are mostly from Crimea but also from Cherson, Donets, Sloviansk and Gorlovska. Because the local administration lack funds they only support those from Crimea. So far, 9,000 IDPs are registered with UNHCR, as a new report shows (UNHCR 2014) but this suggests there are many more who are not registered with the UNHCR or even the local authorities.

Others seek to leave Ukraine altogether though information is scarce. Around 21 March, a group of 32 mostly Crimean Tatars sought asylum in Poland (Inside Poland 2014). Also a Russian citizen, Tatar and resident of Crimea and two Ukrainians from Sevastopol entered Poland for the same purpose; by 7 April by a group of 16 Ukrainian citizens from Crimea followed (Border Monitoring Ukraine 2014). And on 29 April another 12 Ukrainians from Simferopol crossed the Polish border for seeking asylum (http://dpsu.gov.ua/ua/about/news/news_3949.htm). In 2013, asylum applications in Poland had already reached record levels, 12.344, and most applicants were from Russia, notably Chechnya, and other former Soviet Union republics (EMN Poland 2014). By 14 March 2014, 46 Ukrainians have applied for asylum in Switzerland (Bundesamt fur Migration 2014).

This essay considers various short-term and long-term scenarios the current crisis could have on migration from Ukraine

Background

In Russia, Putin utilised his KGB background to establish a kleptocracy, a regime that enables a small class of the powerful and rich (commonly labelled the oligarchs) and their beneficiaries and supporters to plunder the country and its people (see Granville 2003, Guardian 2010, Bobinski 2014).They then largely move their assets abroad, as to Switzerland, Cyprus, Turkey and London or elsewhere. In Ukraine, ex-president Yanukovych who served several prison sentences for robbery and other crimes (Encyclopaedia Britannica) has established a similar regime. He has also centralised the system of corruption meaning that the unduly fees requested by civil servants are transferred up to ladder to Kiev. He also brought many industries under the control of his clan. In Ukraine, corruption of civil servants and politicians is the single most widely made complaint; over 70 percent of Ukrainians, over 80 percent in the West believe that ‘there is a lot of corruption in Ukraine’ (Düvell et al. 2013). Also misappropriation is widespread (for instance, tax payers contributions are utilised to subsidy out-dated industries but are then rather redirected into private pockets (see The Ukrainian Week No.11, 2013). This has hold back modernisation and productivity and subsequently negatively impacted on general living standard and life satisfaction (ibid.). But whilst in Russia this is partly fuelled by its vast natural resources Ukraine has no such resources and since its assets seem to have been exhausted the state is now bankrupt. Both regimes combine politics and crime, and state organs and criminal organisations to loot the country and to control and suppress opponents, competitors and the people. These regimes and their representatives are not only driven by the logic of politics but also by the logics of crime i.e. a ruthless commitment to individual enrichment. Both regimes can thus not only be analysed or understood with the conventional concepts of political science but must also be analysed with the tools of criminology. This also applies to Russia’s foreign policy which must be seen not only as a matter of defending national interests abroad such as its imperial ambitions, its markets or people but as well as securing its kleptocratic regime (see Dawishe 2011).

  In behaviourist theory migration is understood as an ‘exit strategy’ to escape dissatisfying conditions; in contrast, protest is a ‘voice strategy’ to change dissatisfying conditions (see Hirschman 1970). The third option is either loyalty or silently putting up with the given conditions. In our Eumagine project conducted before the crisis from 2011 to 2013 we found that 49.3 per cent of our survey respondents have had an aspiration to migrate (Bilan et al. 2012). This was driven by overall low levels of life dissatisfaction, dissatisfaction with economic opportunities, alienation with the political class, dissatisfaction with public services (notably the health sector) and epidemic corruption. Since 1991, the year of Ukraine’s independence, the country lost 7 million of its population, which was partly due to emigration and partly due to natural population decrease. It is assumed that 3-7 million Ukrainians – no one knows the exact number - are engaged in temporary or permanent migration.

  In 2004, and again in 2013/14 people also turned to protest. The 2004 ‘Orange revolution’ (see Karatnycky 2005), however failed; initial success was frustrated by egomaniac leaders (Yushchenko and Tymoshenko) and then reversed by Yanukovych from the 2010 fraudulent elections. Within less than four years he and his followers have ruined the country and its budget and alienated large parts of its people. The latest uprising in November 2013 was triggered by Yanukovytch’ refusal to sign an Association Agreement and a Free Trade Agreement with the European Union and has meanwhile become known as the ‘EuroMaidan’ (Maidan=square) movement. This reference to Europe demonstrates that the uprising is inspired by the wish to transform the country according to values and practices identified with ‘Europe’ notably democracy, stability, rule of law and accountability. It could be assumed, that at least in some parts of the population this has raised hopes for improvements which in turn could diminish migration aspirations. In our project people explained that in case matters would improve they would no longer want to migrate.

  Migration scenarios

At the outset it should be noted that Ukraine is not any distant country but borders four EU member states, Poland, Slovakia, Hungary and Romania and is in driving distance, meaning that it takes less than 14 hours or so to many others such as Germany, Austria, Italy and others. In addition, hundreds of bus and mini bus lines not to mention airlines including low budget carriers link most parts of Ukraine to many EU member states.

(1)    So one scenario would be that the current conflict with Russia will be resolved soon, that western aid is flowing and that governance and economics improve, that people become confident with the development of Ukraine, that migration aspirations decrease and even that Ukrainians who are currently abroad might consider returning (and last but not least contributing to social transformation). This, however, seems the most optimistic and least realistic scenario.

  (2)    Another scenario could be that Ukraine goes through a prolonged economic crisis; the Financial Times (2014) already refers to a -3.2 percent dip this year. This could be further aggravated by an austerity policy as the likely condition for IMF and EU loans. As yet, Ukrainians might underestimate the costs of such a neo-liberal transformation; indeed, large parts of the population could be thrown into unemployment and relative or absolute poverty as observed in Greece or Spain. As a consequence, migration aspirations would be likely to increase significantly; this could mean that maybe three quarters of the working age population would want to migrate to work abroad.

  (3)    Also in case a pro-Russian regime is reinstalled in Kiev we might see those who lead or sympathise with the revolution to leave for the EU, either as migrants or indeed as refugees. Notably the young and well-educated revolutionaries will leave, just as they did after 2004 and again in 2010 when Yanukovych came to power; others, however, probably the majority won't have this option as they lack the preconditions and would rather stay the alienated they might be.

  (4)    A fourth scenario is related to unfolding violent internal ethnic conflict or even to military intervention by Russia. Also in case the new authority discriminates Russian speakers by banning Russian as an official language tension would grow. In these cases some parts of the Russian speaking population would want or need escape first to Eastern Ukraine and quite some would go to Russia (many have family or other roots there). Ukrainian speakers would rather want or need to move to western Ukraine whilst some would continue to their traditional destinations in the EU, such as Poland, Germany, Italy, Netherlands and Belgium (in the past Spain, Portugal and Greece were major destinations but that's mostly over). These movements would be large-scale and a mix of refugees and economic migrants, if in this context such a distinction would make sense at all. Poland is already preparing for a large-scale influx of refugees from Ukraine; so far, however, only 76 have applied for asylum in 2014 (see BMP 2014). nevertheless, UNHCR now calls on the EU to remove Ukraine from the list of safe third countries (UNHCR 2014).

  (5)    In case of a prolonged Russian occupation or even annexation as it seems of the Crimea the Muslim Tatar minority of 250,000 to 300,000 or so (12 to 15 percent of the population) could become another group of concern. Tatars have first been partly resettled under Tsarist ruling and were under Stalin subsequently deported in their entirety to Central Asia; in course of this so many died that this amounted to genocide whilst ethnic Russians were resettled to Crimea. Tatars only began to return in large numbers after the collapse of Soviet Union and notably from the early 1990s. They already face racial discrimination and threats (UNPO 2013). In their memory Russia is mostly associated with oppression and genocide and it is maybe not surprising they were now amongst the first to protest against the Russian intervention. Tatars are ‘least keen on Russian rule’ (New Republic 2014), could face some reprisal for choosing ‘the wrong side’ and some might be compelled to leave Crimea once more.

(6) Another group of concern are migrants, refugees and asylum seekers in Ukraine (see UNHCR 2014). One the one hand, they are likely to be affected more by the economic problems and thus to lose some or all of their income and become destitute. Also racism has for long a problem in Ukraine (see previous blog) and a rise in nationalism could also result in a rise in racism and xenophobia. Therefore, the issue of third country nationals in Ukrainian and how they are affected by the current situation is another area to watch carefully. 

  (7)    Currently, about 1 million Schengen visa are issued annually to Ukrainians, mostly by Poland. Under the given conditions, i.e. visa requirements few of the people who would want or have to migrate would be able to turn to regular migration channels. In recent years, the Ukrainian Border Guard Service made serious efforts to prevent clandestine border crossings. But in case of further turmoil, violence or a Russian intervention they could let down controls whilst EU forces are unlikely to unilaterally effectively control the EU’s external borders. In any case, irregular migration is likely to considerably increase.

  (8)    So far, around half of all Ukrainian migrants went to Russia, mostly the low educated and Russian speakers, often from Eastern Ukraine.  But Russia had already threatened in summer 2013 to introduce visa requirements to Ukrainians in order to undermine the country’s alignment with the EU and to bring it back under Russian control. Under current conditions Russia might reconsider using this diplomatic weapon. In particular Russian speaking Easterners would find it difficult to move west instead as many don't have the same level of language skills (like Polish or German) or networks/access to information. This would deprive millions of Ukrainians of their source of income and would reduce the flow of remittances which would be a severe blow to the Ukrainian economy and society. But Russia could also try to only use the visa weapon against ethic Ukrainians/Ukrainian speakers (see next argument). In any case this would further increase the migration pressure to the EU.

  (9)    Finally, Russia is already giving out Russian passports to ethnic Russian Ukrainians, first on Crimea and probably also in southern and Eastern Ukraine; although dual citizenship is not permitted under Ukrainian law exactly for this reason i.e. to prevent Russian influence. On the one hand, this undermines ethnic Russians’ loyalty to Ukraine; on the other hand this could facilitate travel and migration to Russia whilst excluding ethnic Ukrainians from doing so.

  So far, little if any crisis induced migration has been observed. Some of the injured were evacuated to Germany for medical treatment and one EuroMaidan activist and torture victim went to Lithuania for medical treatment. However, the TV channel Russia Today (RT) is alleging that ‘675,000 Ukrainians pour into Russia as ‘humanitarian crisis’ looms’ (Twitter 2014). Such false stories could be constructed to prepare and justify Russian armed ‘humanitarian intervention’ to protect ethnic Russians in eastern Ukraine. On the other hand, No Border Ukraine and the Social Action Centre, Kiev, publicly declare that they are ready to support internally displaced persons, Russian anti-war protestors or Russian army deserters fleeing persecution. We might see more such rhetoric and the challenge will be to distinguish false from genuine concerns.

  Conclusion

In the years to come migration pressure from Ukraine is more likely to increase than not and so would be migration, irregular migration and in the worst case even refugee flows. The EU and its member states might soon find themselves in a position where they need to deal with increased migration or even refugee flows from Ukraine. Already on 5 March the Commission of the European Union (2014) agreed a package in support of Ukraine that also encompasses ‘Acceleration of Visa Liberalisation [and to] …offer a Mobility Partnership’. Given the conventional panic over large-scale immigration this is an encouraging signal. Notably Germany, with its hunger for skills and workers might want to consider letting in more Ukrainians. This might actually not be a too unpopular move as recent surveys have shown that 73 percent of Germans are in favour of admitting Ukraine to the EU, 40 percent even suggest that this could happen soon (Der Spiegel 2013). Also Poland, a historical ally of Ukraine, already implements a liberal entry system: of the one million Schengen visa issued annually to Ukrainians two thirds are issued by Poland. If the EU wishes to go beyond cheque book diplomacy and to support Ukraine and its economy, society and people in a more comprehensive manner than it would need to also consider liberalising current visa requirements, employment restrictions, and a migration and development strategy.

Update:

The suffering and dying of Syrian and other Refugees on the outskirts of Europe and which lessons could be learned from the failure of the international community to rescue the European Jews?[i]

‘The British delegate claimed that Britain was already fully populated and suffering from unemployment, so it could take in no refugees’ (1938, at the Evian Jewish refugee conference).

Currently, two related and partly overlapping major human tragedies unfold under the eyes of the European and international community. First, the civil war in Syria which had already begun 2 1/2 years ago so far claimed the lives of at least 115,000 people including 6,000 children (Reuters Oct. 2013); in the same time, 2,202,439 refugees were forced to seek protection in neighbouring countries (UNHCR 2013). Second, since 1988, around 20,000 migrants and refugees who were denied opportunities for legal entry to the EU have died whilst trying to reach the perceived safe territories of the European Union (del Grande 2013). In 2013, so far 695 persons have died; on just one day, the 3 October, 339 mostly Eritrean refugees have lost their lives in a boat accident off the coast of Lampedusa/Italy. One week later, another 160 are feared death as their boat sank off the coast of Sicily (ibid.). In total, from 2009 to 2012, 422,147 migrants and refugees, an average of 105,000 each year, have irregularly reached the European Union (Frontex 2013). In 2012, around 18,000 or 25 Percent took one of the hazardous see routes as from Libya or Tunisia to Italy and Malta or from Turkey to Greece and Italy. In total, probably 1,200,000 migrants and refugees including the 513,000 Syrians in Turkey currently stay in a country in the neighbourhood of the EU (excl. Russia). Most countries in the neighbourhood of the EU either lack the capacity or are unwilling to protect refugees or take a rights-based approach to economic immigration. Notably Libya and Morocco are unviable for most migrants and refugees but also Ukraine is considered a country unsafe for refugees and other vulnerable migrants whilst Turkey places a geographic limitation on refugees from non-European countries who are thus not permitted to stay permanently but must be resettled to other safe countries, so far mostly to the US (for an overview over the conditions of refugees in the EU neighbourhood countries see Düvell 2013). A certain proportion of migrants and refugees is desperate or committed enough to try and reach EU territory by any means necessary. It is on the EU to develop a response that is in line with its responsibilities and values.

At the beginning of October 2013, the European parliament’s liberal and democratic ALDE group called for a ‘humanitarian Conference on the Syrian refugee crisis’ (ALDE 2013). They argue that ‘the attitude of the international community to the tragedy taking place in Syria is a disgrace’ and that they ‘cannot accept that Europe remains largely closed’ and thereby imply that the EU should provide protection and thus admit Syrian refugees. Also the European parliaments’ Civil Liberties Committee (LIBE) called that ‘the EU and its member states should guarantee Syrian refugees safe entry to the EU’ (European Parliament 2013a). With respect to the suffering and dying of other refugees and vulnerable migrants responses so far were much less determined. When EU president Barroso and EU commissioner Malmström visited Lampedusa on 9th October 2013 they remained rather vague, they accepted that the death of 339 mostly Eritrean refugees was a ‘tragedy’ that ‘saddened’ them, they acknowledged despair and hope on the side of the migrants and refugees. But all they concluded was to ‘strengthen our capacity for search and rescue’ but then continued that they must ‘reinforce our joint action against criminals and people smugglers’ (Barroso, European Commission 2013), which means nothing but fighting the very structures that offer (irregular) services to those migrants and refugees who try to escape their fate. Malmström went a little further and promoted ‘open[ing] more channels for regular migration’ and ‘resettle[ing] people in need of asylum and international protection’ (European Commission 2013).

By the end of October 2013, however, the Council of the European Union summit of the heads of governments failed to agree a solution to the ongoing migration and refugee crisis. It was only ‘addressed rhetorically, but little was achieved substantively’ (Der Spiegel, 27/10/13). The ‘council expressed its deep sadness at the recent tragic events in the Mediterranean ...and decided to step up the Union's action so as to prevent such tragedies from happening again’ (CoEU 2013: 1). In the subsequent council conclusions four of 49 paragraphs are devoted to ‘action[s]’ that ‘should [but not must] be taken in order to prevent the loss of lives at sea and to avoid such human tragedies’; these however, were spelled out as prioritising ‘an effective return policy, ...the fight against trafficking and smuggling of human beings, ...reinforcement of Frontex activities in the Mediterranean and along the Southeastern borders of the EU, ...detecting vessels and illegal entries’ and otherwise decided to further delay discussion of what should be sustainable solutions until June 2014. There is no immediate relation between the claim ‘to avoid such human tragedies’ and the policy targets for an ‘effective return policy’ (how is that going to prevent loss of life at sea?), fighting [human] smuggling (how is that preventing the actual suffering in sending and transit countries) or detecting illegal vessels and entries which rather aim at preventing the arrival of unwanted immigrants and refugees in the EU rather than preventing human tragedy, notably if these occur in the country of origin, along the routes as in the Sahara desert or in the countries of transit, like Morocco where by the time they reach the external borders of Europe 36 percent of all migrant women have become victims of sexual violence (Medicins sans Frontieres 2013).

In the meantime, the European parliament (2013b) also approved EUROSUR, a comprehensive European migration surveillance system aiming at ‘prevent[ing], detect[ing] and combat[ing] irregular migration’, nothing but a synonym for refugee and other unwanted flows. Only last minute the parliament included some reference to ‘save[ing] migrants' lives’ though it remains to be seen how these two aims will be balanced, it also implies that those recued at sea might be rather turned back to where they came from than offered protection in the EU. Indeed, on the agenda is an amendment of the Frontex mandate permitting the agency to return back to the point of departure those migrants and refugees rescued in international waters and thus preventing them from making a claim for asylum in the EU. Simultaneously, however, it was decided to set up a European Border Assistance Mission (EUBAM) to Libya and send 111 officers and spend €30 million to support the national authorities to enhance its border controls (EUObserver 2013). Also Italy has reached an agreement with Libya to support in particular its maritime borders and prevent migrants and refugees from departing from its shores (Il Manifesto 2013). So whilst rhetorically certain EU representatives shed some tears over the recent death toll and call for a humanitarian response the actual EU bureaucracy, its agencies and its member states continue with business as usual which is to consider dealing with migration as a battle - ‘combating’ or ‘fighting illegal migration’ are the terms most often used - and focus on further enhancing borders protection to prevent the arrival of unwanted flows of migrants, refugees and other people in need of international protection.

The war in Syria is now in its third year and the dying of refugees, often from Somalia, Sudan, Eritrea or Mali, and other vulnerable migrants in the Mediterranean dates back to 1988 and has thus now been observed for over 15 years. Since then, around 20,000 people have lost their lives whilst hundreds of thousands got stuck in countries that provide little or no protection to people in need. The failure so far of the European and international community to offer timely and effective protection to refugees and other vulnerable migrants calls to memory the failure or rather refusal of the international community to rescue the European Jews from the Nazis and the holocaust, notably the 1938 Evian conference respectively the 1943 Bermuda Conference.

To recall briefly: From 6-15 July 1938, an international refugee conference was held in Evian, France, attended by representatives of 32 countries, the western Allies including the US, UK, France, Australia, New Zealand, various Latin America and some European countries, to discuss the fate of Jewish refugees in Europe. By that time, 150,000 Jews had already fled Germany, but 450,000 were still stuck in Germany, and another 185,000 were brought under Nazi ruling when they occupied Austria. ‚Many German and Austrian Jews tried to go to the United States but could not obtain the visas needed to enter’ (US Holocaust Memorial Museum). ‘During the conference, it became painfully obvious that no country was willing to volunteer anything’; instead the arguments made were ‘...at a time when there is serious unemployment, ...countries of refuge and settlement are faced with problems, not only of an economic and social nature, but also of public order, and that there is a severe strain on the administrative facilities and absorptive capacities of the receiving countries‘ (Jewish Virtual Library), ‘the British delegate claimed that Britain was already fully populated and suffering from unemployment, so it could take in no refugees. [they even declared Jewish migration to the Palestinian territories ‘illegal’ and tightened its controls]...The French delegate declared that France had reached "the extreme point of saturation as regards admission of refugees"’ (Yad Vashem). No country except the Dominican Republic admitted Jewish refugees or expanded its quota for European migrants, rather the opposite. The consequences are know, in November 1938, the Nazis initiated the Reichskristallnacht, in 1939, after occupying Poland they and began deporting Jews there and from 1941 the ‘Final Solution’ was enforced. The Intergovernmental Committee on Political Refugee (IGC) set up as a result of the conference, in some way a predecessor of some of today’s international migration organisations, also failed to change the tide (see Weingarten 1981)[ii]. From 19 - 29 April 1943, five years later and well into the Holocaust another bilateral refugee conference was held, this time, on Bermuda but only involving the US and the UK (see Culbertson 1994). Tabled was the suggestion to resettle Jewish refugees from neutral countries and thereby encourage these to then accept more refugees from Nazi-occupied territories. But not even the dying of Jews in the Warsaw ghetto uprising which coincided with the conference could convince the governments to take any meaningful action. In 1943, after 12 days of negotiations no decision was made to come to the rescue of the European Jews. At the end of the day six million Jews and millions of Roma, political activists and homosexuals were killed.

The main lesson learned from Nazi ruling, World War II, the Holocaust and the failure to rescue to European Jews has been ‘Never Again!’, but is this still remembered? These days, refugee resettlement from Libya, Tunisia, Jordan or Turkey is on the agenda but with the exception of Germany and a few other countries (see British Refugee Council 2013) but not the UK have subscribes to this; unfortunately, they only agreed to accept small numbers, 10,000 and thus ‘a drop in the ocean’ (Reuters 2013) and this despite the recent deaths of hundreds of refugees in the Mediterranean. Instead, a European not to mention international solution is not in sight. Some of the arguments made in the 1930s and 1940s, ‘overpopulation’, ‘unemployment’, ‘public order’ which would now translate into ‘security’ or ‘strains on administrative facilities’ very much resemble the arguments made these days explaining why these people can’t be admitted to the EU. So it seems that the political and diplomatic mechanisms and excuses made today are similar to those made in the 1930s and 1940s and that the lessons from the failure of the 1938 and 1943 refugee conferences have not been learned, or have they...

  [i] November is a month of remembrance, one of the relevant dates is the 9th November, the Kristall- or Reichspogromnacht and the first step towards the Holocaust. The lessons learned are that then democracy failed to stop the rise of the Nazis, that  the western democracies failed to stop its expansion before it was too late, and that they failed to intervene on behalf of Jews and other persecuted groups. The lessons to be learned are moral imperatives (notably ‘never again’, ‘the right to have rights’), but also the methodologies developed by scholars like Arendt, Weingarten and Goldhagen who analysed the functioning of law, bureaucracies, diplomacy and its individual actors in this context.

In January 2014, seven years after Romania and Bulgaria were admitted as member states to the European Union temporary migration and employment restrictions of their citizens will be lifted in nine other EU member states (Austria, Belgium, Germany, Luxemburg, Malta, Netherlands, Spain (only Romanians), and UK) and Switzerland) (European Commission 2012). All other EU countries had already lifted restrictions at an earlier stage.

In the UK a moral panic broke out over ‘tidal floods of new immigrants’ (MEP Bloom, UKIP) from Romania and Bulgaria. The Telegraph warned that ‘Britain [is] powerless to stop tens of thousands of Bulgarians and Romanians moving to UK’ (11/11/2012). The Sun (11/11/2012) lamented about ‘Romanian and Bulgarian immigrants ...threatening to swamp Britain — and flood our overstretched jobs market’. And an e-petition implies that as many as Poles, up to 600,000 could come, often to seek benefits (HM Government 2013). In an almost desperate move politics considers a negative image campaign to deter migrants from coming (The Guardian, 27/1/2013). One focus is immigrants’ access to welfare benefits, for instance, Iain Duncan Smith, Work and Pensions Secretary argued that ‘people shouldn't use the free movement rules just to travel around, looking for the best benefits they can get’ (quoted from Migrants Rights Network 2013). In Germany, the debate is more nuanced. On the one hand, migrants from Eastern and Southern Europe, notably the highly skilled, are welcomed to fuel the economy (Der Spiegel, 26/2/2013a). On the other hand, a discursive ‘threat’ frame on ‘poverty migration’ (‘Armutsmigration’) (Sueddeutsche Zeitung 28/2/2012) has emerged. The Focus (1/3/2013) titles ‘poor Romanians and Bulgarian immigrants attack Germany’ and the Spiegel (26/2/2013b) highlights poor immigrants from the A2 countries congesting homeless shelters and other social services.

In this context a number of issues needs to be raised:

-          What is the historical context of the current debate?

-          What is the migration potential of Romania and Bulgaria?

-          Where would they go?

-          Would they claim benefits?

-          What is the discursive purpose of this debate?

The context

Initially, both countries, both currently under conservative/liberal coalition governments opted for restricting access to employment for citizens of Romania and Bulgaria. Their starting points, however, differ significantly.

First, in 2004, when Poland, Lithuania, Hungary and others joined the EU only the UK, Sweden and Ireland opened its borders to migration whilst Germany and all other EU member states imposed restrictions to employment. As a consequence, around 900,000 A8 citizens moved to the UK; in 2011, there were still 579,000 Polish and 97,000 Lithuanian residents in England and Wales (ONS 2011). In Germany, in 2010 there were 690,000 registered A8 nationals (BAMF 2013) almost as many as in the UK though numbers had build up over a longer period of time.

Second, in 2004, when the borders opened for free movement from the A8 countries academics predicted that fewer than 20,000 people would come to the UK, a ludicrously low estimate, and that's what the government told the public. But in the end many more came and the public felt misled by the government. This is kind of a ‘moral trauma’ which all parties aim to avoid repeating. In Germany, restrictions were kept in place and no such sudden influx and no such moral trauma occurred.

Third, the UK still is in an economic crisis, unemployment stands at 2.5 million, around 8 percent (BBC, 17/10/2012) whereas Germany enjoys constant economic growth and a record low of unemployment, 2.9 million, 6.8 percent (HAZ, 3/1/2013). Thus whilst the UK’s policy goal is to reduce net migration Germany rather wants more immigration in response to population ageing and skills shortages.

How many people would or could migrate from Romania and Bulgaria?

Romania has a population of 29 million and Bulgaria 7 million, 29 million in total; much less than Poland’s 39 million people. Both countries have ageing and shrinking populations and the lowest fertility rates in Europe (Hoff 2011). The cohort of young people who are most likely to migrate is shrinking; there are around 6.5 million Romanians and 2.1 million Bulgarians in the age group 20-39 (CIA 2013a; CIA 2013b), 8.6 million in total. So far, 1.9 million Romanians and 0.35 million Bulgarians have already emigrated to other EU countries (Eurostat 2010, OSI 2011), 80,000 Romania-born persons to the UK (ONS 2011) and 160,000 to Germany (BAMF 2013). Meanwhile, labour and skills shortages are reported from Bulgaria and in both countries some immigration as well as return migration has been observed (OECD 2012). But how many more would come?

Migration Watch (2013) simply suggests that just because the income difference between Romania and UK is 1:8 this would trigger annual migration of 50,000 people. Serious migration studies, however, are aware that the drivers of migration are much more complex and that migration systems, migration networks, migration politics, opportunity-constraints structures, social and human capital, perceptions and imaginations, individual characteristics and emotions play crucial roles. Thus, the 50,000 people per annum coming from the A2 as claimed by Migration Watch is a mere theoretical product based on a simplifying mono-causal economic model; instead one would need to deduct from the results of this model the various other diminishing factors as listed above (though admittedly these are hardly measurable).

Second, due to shrinking and ageing populations the emigration potential is almost naturally limited and will soon or has already been exhausted, notably in the age group 20-39. This trend is reinforced by improving economic conditions. Indeed, OSI (2011) found that migration from Bulgaria has been significantly decreasing since the peak in the early 2000. It is also noteworthy that Denmark with its growing economy and generous welfare state which in 2009 had opened its borders to A8 nationals in 2010 only attracted about 2,500 Romanians and 1,200 Bulgarians but no ‘floods’ (OECD 2012).

Third, both countries enjoy economic growth (World Bank, 17/1/2013), rising GDPs and decreasing unemployment levels, 6.6 percent in Romania, well below the UK level (7.7 percent) though 12.4 percent in Bulgaria (Eurostat 2013).

In any case, the migration potential from the A2 countries is limited to a small percentage of the 8.6 million people in the age group 20-39 and their dependents. If one would assuming that 10 percent of this cohort would migrate - and this is an arbitrary scenario - either all at once, which is unlikely or over the course of five years, as in the case of Poland, this would amount to 860,000 in total or 172,000 per year over a five-year period. They would be dispersed across the seven top EU and three non-EU destination countries (for a list see below). So, an average of 60,200 potential migrants would move to each of the top seven EU destination countries, no more than 12,040 annually over a five years period, more to the top and fewer to the other destinations. A further 25,800 would to move to non-EU countries. The main uncertainties are (a) the behaviour of the discriminated Roma population, 3-10 percent in Romania and 6-12 percent in Bulgaria of this age group and (b) the potential of secondary migration within the EU. So far, no quantifiable observations have been made.

In sum, the era of mass emigration from the A2 countries is over; instead all A8 and A2 countries already begin to attract immigrants, current perceptions are informed by past experiences and it is time to adjust old perceptions to new realities. Nevertheless, some secondary migration within the EU will occur but on a low level and mostly of the highly skilled.

Where would they go?

Romanians traditionally migrated to other neighbouring and southern EU countries where jobs are available in the shadow economy but also for linguistic reasons, Romanian, Italian and Spanish are similar languages. The top destination countries are Italy, Spain, Hungary, the United States, Germany, Portugal, Canada, Austria and France, the United Kingdom only comes eleventh; Bulgarians mostly migrate to Spain, Germany, Greece, Italy and Portugal followed by Canada and the US but not the UK (e.g. IOM 2008, OSI 2011). It is often assumed that immigrant populations trigger a network effect and facilitate more immigration, in the same order as listed above, hence the UK is one of the least likely destinations. On the other hand, immigrant communities suffering from economic hardship also discourage further immigration and thus the network effect diminishes (as observed in case of Algerian migration to France, see Collyer 2005). This can result in some diversion to less prominent destination, like the UK, Denmark or the Netherlands; however, the lack of social networks, language barrier as well as unfavourable economic conditions set limits to this potential. These limitations also apply to the potential for relocation to other EU countries.

Are Romanians and Bulgarians benefits claimants?

Several sources claim that benefits are a major driver of migration, which is usually supported by numerically small ad hoc observation. This is based on the crude so-called ‘benefits magnet theory’ (e.g. Brueckner, 2000); meanwhile, however, it has been shown that social services and benefits are rather an extra that inform decisions for labour migration (Razin & Wahba 2011). Accordingly, OSI (2011) found that 73 percent of Bulgarians and even 84 percent of the Roma went abroad for working, the remaining were mainly students. Indeed, it is usually found that migrants’ net contribution to the fiscal system is either neutral (e.g. Rowthorn, 2008) or positive (Dustmann et al. 2010). In addition, migration increases employment of the domestic work force (Ortega and Peri 2011) and thereby tax revenues. So even if some migrants eventually claim benefits the overall net contribution of all immigrants is normally positive.

The old game: blaming the immigrants

The current debate (1) links the suffering of the British people and in particular the working class from the economic crisis, welfare cuts and lack of jobs to immigration and blames immigrants for perceived congestions in these areas. It thus moves the focus of attention from the true perpetrators, governments and banks and the politics of deregulation that paved the way for the banking and financial crisis and instead scapegoats immigrants. (2) It diverts attention from the governments’ failure to provide sufficient services and create jobs and instead in a Malthusian twist alleges there are too many people, job seekers and claimants. These are de facto xenophobic (in German ‘ausländerfeindliche’) politics. And (3), notably the British debate links unwanted European immigration to ‘the EU’ and blames European law for undermining the UK’s capacity to control migration. This is then used to further fuel an already heated anti-European, protectionist and nationalist agenda (see Düvell 2011). Hence, these discourses exploit the alleged large-scale arrival of Romanian and Bulgarian immigrants for policy goals that have little to do with migration.

Conclusion: Controversy over migration from Romania and Bulgaria reveal class and welfare issue

The European Union has created a space of free mobility, thus a European market for labour, education and businesses has been created. The current controversy over migration from Romania and Bulgaria, however, illustrates that those who work, in particular the highly skilled are rather welcomed whilst the poor and potential benefits claimants are not. The underlying suggestion is that the poor should stay put whilst only the highly skilled are appreciated to migrate. However, EU law does not make class, income or skills a condition for enjoying the right of free moment and instead insists that this is a fundamental right to be enjoyed indiscriminately by everybody.

Thus, this controversy reveals three major problems, (1) gross social inequalities across the EU which compels people to seek residence elsewhere, (2) the lack of a European welfare model that would provide sufficient benefits to all EU citizens wherever they live and (3) the incomplete enforcement of minority and fundamental rights for Roma. Hence, in order to reduce the internal European migration pressures social inequality and deficiencies in welfare politics must be addressed.

(After a long period of silence caused by an extremely busy period of working I am back now and will blog more regularly again).

I am just finishing a three-years EU FP7 funded project EUmagine - Imagining Europe from the outside (http://www.eumagine.org/). Last week, the international project consortium held the final project conference in Brussels to present our findings to a mixed EU, international and national policy-maker and academic audience. This was an important event in our dissemination strategy (which now is an important element in any research proposal). It was only too logic that we also present our findings at my host institute COMPAS here in Oxford. For this purpose, because we were all already in Brussels, I also invited my colleague from Ukraine with whom COMPAS collaborated for three years in a ‘geographic duo team’ (GDT, our funders, the EU liked the idea of a non-Eurocentric partner and management structure).

In our field, international migration, it is almost inevitable that we collaborate with colleagues from others countries and often from those where migrants come from. Indeed, some of the countries we study are perceived by policy and public as migrant sending, even as sending countries of irregular immigrants. It has always been a hassle to engage in such collaborations because our colleagues normally need two visa, one for the Schengen area and one for the UK, and this takes double time and money. Already once, I was asked by a colleague from Ukraine or Russia, I can’t remember, to come to Brussels for a meeting as she did not want to apply for this extra visa to the UK.

So between Brussels and London, and between the idea and the seminar there is the ‘UK Border’.

My colleague, assistant professor at her university, holds an academic visa for the UK, it is my colleague’s second visa of this kind, she has been to the UK before as visiting academic on the very same project, on this and her previous visa. She also travels frequently to other EU destinations for similar activities, so her passport is full of visa and stamps, entry&exit, entry&exit. Therefore, I just invited my colleague and both of us did not bother much about immigration matters as this seemed just another routine visit for academic purposes. But when we arrived at the border coming from Brussels late at night, the flight was delayed due to the bad winter weather, I was through within minutes; but then I was waiting for my colleague and she didn’t turn up. So I went back to check what was going on: there were no queues at Heathrow, how unusual, only a handful of non-EU passengers but several immigration desks opened and she was hold up my an immigration officer. He began asking questions, or rather he was shooting questions at her without giving much time for thinking, ‘what is the purpose of your visit’ (seminar, and then visit some library), ‘do you have an invitation’ (no, she meant she had not printed it out), ‘do you have a return flight’ (no, because I might need to leave early), ‘where do you stay’ (at this address), ‘how long do you stay’ (maximum 21 days, terms is over in Ukraine), ‘do you work in the UK (no). Then the immigration officer even took four finger prints (on TV this signals that you are suspected of a crime); finally he took the passport, issued a paper explaining what he did and went towards some offices. I took the opportunity to approach and ask him if there is a problem and he immediately shooted questions at me, ‘who are you’ (colleague so and so), ‘what’s the purpose of the visit’ (EU-funded project, international cooperation, seminar), is it for the government' (no), 'does she work for you' (no, it's just a seminar). He went for some extra checks, whatever these are, and after about a long 20 minutes my colleague was allowed entry.

However, in the meantime, I as the invitee felt pretty bad, I was shaken, not to mention my colleague, I felt somehow guilty because through my invitation I had exposed my colleague to this rather uncomfortable situation. I also became angry because this case illustrates the complications imposed to us by UK immigration law with respect to international collaboration with colleagues from outside the EU. Ok, my colleague had no invitation printed out and no return ticket but she has a visa, it was her second entry on this visa, exactly as stated on the visa application 9 month earlier (one stay as visiting academic, one visit for a seminar), a clean visa record and in the past she was not required, recommended or asked these documents.

For me the one issue is the inconsistency in the immigration control, twice there was no request for an invitation for the individual visit (but there was off course the initial invitation required for the visa application which accurately stated the two visits) or the return ticket but at the third time there was this expectation by the immigration officer. So what is the rule, what is it one needs to prepare colleagues for, what is it I as invitee must provide and how can one know to prepare for this? If entry conditions are explained somewhere then one can prepare for this and meet the requirement but if they are not explained than the entry control seems quite arbitrary to me and designed to introduce additional obstacles that can be used to refuse entry to almost any non-EU visitor.