by Jessica Reed
More than sixty African and European countries, along with twenty international NGOs and regional organisations will meet on the 10th and 11th of July at the first Euro-African conference on migration and development in Rabat, Morocco.
The conference aims to "link migration with the imperative of development" and contribute towards launching a renewed cooperation between Africa and Europe. In plainspeak, the conference will focus on tackling the issue of illegal migration. According to the french newspaper Le Monde, 9 983 clandestines have sailed to the Canaries Islands between January the 1st and the 15th of June 2006, compared to 1730 in 2005, which constitues an increase of approximately 600 %.
There is no doubt that these increased flows of population represent a growing challenge for southern European countries such as Spain and Italy. The sad examples of the enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla -where many migrants died-, coupled with the images of hundreds of people climbing barbed wired
fences (link to .pdf academic file) to gain access to the spanish coastlines tell us another story.
The Conference's objective is to get African countries to accept a quick and "clean" repatriation of illegal migrants from Europe, as well as an enhanced system of surveillance and monitoring of all African borders which includes army reinforcements to the border police.This will work in tandem with Moroccan guards on the other side.
It seems rather unfortunate that the conference's decisions will once again reinforce the EU's image as an excluding fortress, rather than deal with the root causes of the problem. For many, Europe has become the only viable option if they want to survive and escape poverty, starvation, unemployment and armed conflicts. One could also wonder that by choosing to close its borders so ferociously, doesn't the EU reinforce its image of an unattainable land of opportunity, making itself even more desirable?
See also: OpenDemocracy & Demos' report "People Flow", which sets out an alternative approach to mass migration (link to .pdf report) aiming to replace the "illusion of control".
