Images de Scanner, migrants intercepted, by Sara Prestianni. All rights reserved.When Libyan refugee slave markets were exposed on CNN in November 2017, the world was rightly shocked. President Macron declared the news “scandalous” and promised an emergency operation to rescue migrants; EU Commission President Juncker said he couldn’t sleep easily with the knowledge. Yet seven months on, Amnesty International has reported that even higher numbers of refugees are being detained in Libya, kept in dire conditions. It is hard to know if Juncker is still suffering fitful sleep but he certainly can’t act surprised.
The increase in detained refugees in Libya is the inevitable consequence of a deliberate EU policy of turning neighbouring countries into border guards – insisting on them increasing border control measures and funding the equipment and training to carry it out. The growth in refugee detainee numbers in Libya is precisely because the EU trained and equipped the Libyan Coast Guard to pick up and return refugees. Italy provided ten of the patrol boats, which were used to pick up and detain 6,340 refugees between January and May this year. The EU Emergency Trust Fund for Africa shows that, out of five strategic objectives, most EU money goes to projects under the 'Improved migration management' goal.
Libya is a prominent example of a more general trend. A new report, 'Expanding the Fortress' by Stop Wapenhandel (Dutch Campaign Against Arms Trade) and the Transnational Institute (TNI) shows that at least 35 countries have been prioritised to receive EU support that strengthens and militarises their border security. All of these countries are considered high risk environments for human rights and nearly half are considered authoritarian. Yet this hasn’t stopped the EU from providing support to their police and security forces that are most responsible for human rights abuses.
