Today, we members of the Interior Committee voted on the parliamentary positions on four dossiers of the Migration and Asylum Pact presented by the Commission in September 2020. All four were adopted in committee. Specifically, the European Parliament’s position on the screening regulation, the amended asylum procedure regulation, the regulation on asylum and migration management and the crisis regulation. The negotiations …
Greece: Inhumane conditions in deportation prison
Eleven refugees in the Paranesti deportation prison in northern Greece went on hunger strike to draw attention to the catastrophic and inhumane conditions in the camp. The systematic and arbitrary detention of people on the run in Greece has been documented in two investigations by the Border Violence Monitoring Network and Mobile Info Team. In the reports, …
Mass deaths are increasingly becoming a political failure of the EU
On Wednesday, members of the European Parliament will debate the recent cases of people who drowned while fleeing across the Mediterranean Sea. In recent weeks, it has become apparent that rescues are deliberately delayed and that many people could be saved. For example, on Sunday there was a shipwreck in which the Italian authorities more …
Interview with WDR 5 on the shipwreck off Calabria
In an interview with WDR 5, I made it clear that we should focus on sea rescue and a solidarity-based distribution of refugees in Europe instead of always demanding higher penalties for smugglers.
New Frontex chief Hans Leijtens must focus on human rights
The new Executive Director of the EU's border management agency Frontex, Hans Leitjens, will take up his post on 1 March. He was appointed in December for a five-year term. Here you can also find a chronology of the allegations against Frontex. In my press release of 28.02 I sent the following statement to journalists: "After the resignation of Fabrice Leggeri, Frontex …
More than 60 dead: "People could have been saved.“
After the accident of a boat off the coast of Calabria with more than 200 people on board, the search for survivors continues. More than 60 bodies have already been recovered. The boat has left in Turkey, bypassed Greece, because refugees are illegally rejected and mistreated there, and headed for Italy, hundreds of kilometers away. Long before …
T-Online reports on the refugee summit of the federal and state governments
T-Online asked me for my assessment of the federal-state refugee summit. I made it clear that rhetoric about sealing off and deporting refugees will not solve the problems and that we need pragmatic solutions instead.
Radio eins: EU Special Summit Migration
In an interview with radio eins, I called for a humane European asylum policy instead of even more isolation. More about the summit and the current state of EU asylum policy can be found in my press release and briefing.
The call for new fences is the capitulation to the real challenges
At its special meeting, the European Council dealt with flight and migration. The focus, not for the first time, is on measures to combat symptoms, compartmentalization and externalization. Meanwhile, the negotiations on the new European Asylum Pact still do not give the impression of ultimately finding a solution to the mistreatment of refugees at the external borders and the lack of solidarity …
Volodomyr Selenskyj in the European Parliament
Today Volodomyr Selenskyj spoke to us in the European Parliament. He emphasized the "European-Ukrainian values", fundamental and human rights and promoted Ukraine's accession to the EU. Ukraine's EU accession will still take time, this is not a short-distance run, but it is right to support Ukraine on this path – especially in the fight against the …