The situation with migrants and illegal immigration

[Gingermakesmesick]

What is the answer?

I would hate to be in the position of making the decision because I hate to think of how desperate the individuals concerned must be.

But I can also quite see that there simply isn't the physical room to allow all of them into the UK, or the resources.

What is the answer? Is there no answer?

ginger don't worry about it

German Chancellor Angela Merkel did something really good this week: Her country will now allow Syrian refugees, who normally would be deported back to wherever they first entered the European Union, to stay and apply for asylum. Thousands of Syrians who would have otherwise faced uncertainty in Europe can now begin the process of rebuilding their lives in Germany.

We should be doing this.

it is the dehumanising language of the right wing media. not yourfault ginger

what ubik said

The long term answer is to have equality and democracy throughout the globe. Achieving that is never going to be easy or quick when those with the most wealth and the most power are mostly interested in increasing and protecting their wealth and power.

It's not a case of changing one cog in the system, the whole system needs to be overhauled.

And I agree that we should be letting them in. We are one of the richest nations in the world. As a country we can afford it if that's what we decide to prioritise.

Not going to happen under this government though.

Well there are endless debates about this in the media. Some of the ideas which I think would work are:

1. Intercept boats leaving Libya and elsewhere, return the migrants safely to shore, sink the boats.
2. Set up an EU task force to aggressively seek out and destroy the trafficking networks.
3. Set up centres in countries of embarkation where migrants can apply for asylum in Europe and have their claims rapidly processed by the UNHCR before they leave. Those that are granted asylum are shared out equally between EU nations and given safe passage to their host country.
4. Set up reception centres in host countries where migrants are assessed for skills and given language lessons. Germany is adapting disused buildings for this purpose. Many of those fleeing Syria, for instance, are skilled and well educated and with the right assistance could easily be got into work. Reception centres should be dotted around the country, not all in the south-east.

The biggest problem is getting everyone in Europe to agree. Because of their lack of decision making people are dying by their 100s and flooding across borders in a completely random and uncontrolled fashion. We have no idea who they are, where they're from, and its extremely dangerous on both sides. Europe cannot and will not secure its borders. Its a joke.

Suzanne ...re "So this migration monster was unleashed by the chain of events which gave birth to ISIS?"

More like Alawite President Assad of Syria murdering his own Sunni citizens grew ISIS - as their Sunni caliphate straddling Syria and Iraq was to protect Sunnis from both Assad and the post war Shia Iraq government - and then ISIS, killing anyone not 'with them' including moderate Sunnis.

But this problem is years old, and why the UK government wanted to STOP Assad by taking out Assad's military hardware STILL killing his own citizens, but were democratically stopped by parliament.

UN: 9 million Syrians now displaced as conflict ticks into fourth year
america.aljazeera.com/articles/2014/3/14/syriaa-s-forciblydisplacedtop9million.html

“Syrian civil war death toll rises to more than 191,300, according to UN”
www.theguardian.com/world/2014/aug/22/syria-civil-war-death-toll-191300-un

"We need to start allowing these people to claim asylum in Britain. We need a proper system set up."

Those that fully support our EU membership, the open borders – will also say that we have to allow in those seeking asylum when there is no end to the queue - but then at election times, complain there are not enough homes, school places and the NHS will collapse 20 minutes after the General Election.

WE cannot take in both hundreds of thousands EU workers/citizens AND shed loads of asylum seekers, so which is it???

We can. We just might prefer not to.

If you don't want to allow refugees to come here or don't want to put up with whatever inconveniences it brings or even that you think it would impoverish Britain to the point that we'd be in no better a position than refugees themselves then that is one thing, But don't state we 'can't' as fact. It's possible.

Forced to choose I'd take asylum seekers. Greatest need comes first.

Agreed, waffly.

It's fucked up, terrible and tragic and is a situation that's not going away. Most of the refugees are young men who have experienced terrible, tough times, are disaffected, without a homeland and are no doubt nursing a good degree of anger.

By the way - apparently that picture I posted of the Syrian woman trying to save her baby from drowning was photoshopped in the Arab world so that her head is covered

Photoshopped. Jeezo.

If ever the EU should be working together to sort out an EU wide plan for an issue then this is it! Enough of the handwringing!

I think they should properly finance centres near the main dismbarking points in places like Italy and Greece with family rooms, dormortories, healthcare etc and "process" people quickly. They could use former army bases perhaps.Only those from an agreed list of "unsafe" countries should be the granted asylum and should be registered and placed within the EU quickly with all members sharing the burden(perhaps the economic migrants should be returned to the Libyan or Turkish coast ). All EU countries should agree to provide the same benefits to the refugees/asylum seekers financed from a central EU fund and perhaps (I know it's hard) but there should be no choice of where you are allocated initially.Anyone caught trying to traverse borders to a specific place would be returned to Greece/Italy or wherever they first landed to be assessed and maybe sanctioned in some way to deter others.

But they are paying traffickers to get them to specific places of choice.... They don't want to be allocated a country

Err... No refugees are paying traffickers to get them the hell out and they don't care where.

Traffickers are taking them to wherever they have contact.

Like, you think desperate war torn refugees are picking and choosing boats like we choose a holiday.

Lenuccia is suggesting not letting them.

I think they should be able to put countries of preference in their applications. If one country is oversubscribed then they can deal with it then.

squidzin calm down!

I just read an account of how once they are arriving they are requesting smartphones to contact those who have gone before them. Maybe family or friends, makes sense they would want to regroup with people who are alike and who may be familiar to them

Also, those in Calais definitely want the UK and would,most likely would not agree to be moved elsewhere

Genuine question here. If the crisis in Syria is being caused by rival Muslim factions, why are the UK and the USA to blame for the conflict?

Maca well that's hardly surprising. If I - God forbid - was ever in that situation, the first thing I would want to do would be to contact loved ones to let them know I was safe

1. Maca, was this read in the Daily Mail by any chance?

1. Morris, When Blair/Bush steamed into Iraq to remove the Secular Saddam Hussein they also removed the only regime keeping extreme ME Muslims under control.

The lawlessness and upheaval created by our Iraq invasion lead to perfect conditions for the rise of ISIS.

Well what is wrong with the people in Calais specifically wanting to come to the UK? As I already said somewhere when people have asked why the UK mostly it's because they know someone here, or because they speak english so think it will make it easier for them.

Unless you think out of all countries the UK should not have to take any then it's fine that some want to come here. Some want to come here and we should be willing to take some.

Not all refugees want to come to the UK.

I repeat

Not all refugees want to come to the UK.

We aren't that fucking brilliant.

With all of his faults, Saddam Hussein did not stand for in infighting between extreme religious factions, The USA and Blairites failed to recognise this and failed to provide stability in any form.

Hardly any refugees are coming here! A mere 1% or something. The Daily Mail etc would have you believe otherwise.