Category Archives: English Channel / La Manche

Migreurop has released its second report on Europe’s borders: “European borders- Controls, detention and deportations.”  Migreurop describes the report as a “[denunciation of] the « externalization » process of the European union migratory policy [which] shows how third countries are obliged, through the threat of the reconsideration of cooperation agreements and development aid, not only to readmit the migrants chased from Europe, but also to keep them on their own territory from travelling towards its doors.   From Calais area in France to the edge of Turkey and the Adriatic sea, from the surroundings of Gibraltar to the Sahel Saharan desert and the new member states of eastern Europe, a subcontracting of migratory control is carried out in series, sometimes very far away from the Union but also within its territory, especially when it deals with sending asylum seekers from country to country considered as unwanted. A large population of exiles, from both sides of the European borders, is subjected to arbitrary incarceration, wandering, and the constant humiliation of a hostile environment….”

Here is the Table of Contents:

Introduction

• What have migrants become 3

Ceuta, a gilded prison

• A murderous border 7
• A legal limbo 8
• The situation of migrants in detention 8
• The situation of migrants in the CETI (open centre) 9
• Deportations and expulsions 12
• Surviving without resources 14

Sahel-Saharan countries, Europe’s new sentries

• I – European interference in inter-African migrations – the case of Mauritania 18
  • The “crisis of the cayucos” 18
  • 1. Cooperation instigated by Europe 18
  • 2. Mauritania tramples on its own principles and conforms 21
  • 3. Subcontracting repression and endangering foreigners 22
• II – Bargaining between Libya and Europe: migrants as an exchange currency –the case of Niger 33
  • 1. A reciprocal exploitation 34
  • 2. An increasingly repressive control of borders 37
  • 3. Arrests and detention in Libyan territory 39
  • 4. A deadly expulsion policy 42
• Conclusion: the real face of Kadhafi’s pan-Africanism 44

Poland, Romania: how to be good state members in the enlarged EU

• I – At the new frontiers: the screening of migration 47
  • 1. Reducing the transit and deserving Schengen 48
  • 2. The border police, Frontex and cooperation with other European states 48
• II – Reception and detention centres 52
  • 1. The detention of foreigners 52
  • 2. Reception centres: isolating asylum seekers 60
  • 3. “Dublinized” asylum seekers 61
• III – Returns 63
• IV – Intolerance towards migrants and refugees 66
• V – Embryonic mobilizations 70

The Ionian and Adriatic seas: forced returns between Italy and Greece

• A new migration route at Europe’s gates 73
• I – Controlling and blocking 75
  • 1. Controls in Greece 75
  • 2. Controls at sea 77
  • 3. Controls in Italian ports 78
• II – Turning back and readmission 82
  • 1. Arbitrary practices and violation of rights 82
  • 2. The port of Venice: collective returns 83
  • 3. The port of Ancona 86
  • 4. Forced return to Greece 86
• III – Detention 88
  • 1. At the borders and at sea: areas beyond legality 88
  • 2. Detention in Italy 89
  • 3. Detention in Greece 90
• IV – Some cruel situations 93
  • 1. In Greece 93
  • 2. In Italy 96
• V – Mobilizations 97
  • 1. In Venice 97
  • 2. In Ancona 97
  • 3. In Greece 98

Ping-pong at the Greco-Turkish border

• Selective expulsions and random readmissions 106
• Reactions to a degrading and sometimes murderous situation 107
• Assistance, support, resistance 108

Dismantling the Calais jungle: a deceptive operation

• I – The declared objectives of the 22 September 2009 operation 112
• II – The real objectives of dismantling the jungle 113
• III – The Modus Operandi: brutality and trickery 115
• IV – What next? 116

Migreurop network 121

Annexes 122

• Knocking down walls and defending the right to migrate 122
• UNHCR-Libya : the bid is rising, migrants pay the price 124
• All for the closure of camps for migrants, in Europe and beyond 125
• Italia and Libya: hand in hand 127
• Roma people victims of the French government xenophobia 128

Click here for the report (EN), or  here (FR), or here (ES).

Click here for article (ES) in Periodismo Humano about the report.