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DE RUEHBS #0701/01 1301432
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R 091432Z MAY 08
FM USEU BRUSSELS
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC
INFO RUCNMEU/EU INTEREST COLLECTIVE
RUCNMEM/EU MEMBER STATES COLLECTIVE
RUEHGV/USMISSION GENEVA

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 BRUSSELS 000701 
 
SIPDIS 
 
GENEVA FOR M.NICHOLSON 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PREF PREL EUN
SUBJECT: EU MIGRATION POLICY ELUSIVE 
 
¶1. France, which will assume the rotating EU presidency on 
July 1, has made migration one of its top presidency 
priorities, with President Sarkozy saying the EU should speak 
with one voice on migration policy.  But moves toward a 
common migration policy reveal tensions over Commission 
versus member state competencies, law enforcement versus 
protection concerns, and perceptions versus realities of 
migrants' cultural and economic impact on receiving 
societies.  As Ambassador Swing arrives in Brussels May 16 
for a series of meetings with the EU and the Belgian 
government, he will find an EU grappling with balancing the 
need for migrant labor with security and cultural concerns. 
The Commission is working on numerous migration initiatives, 
including a common asylum policy, a "blue card" for skilled 
migrants, support for circular migration, and a returns 
directive for those denied asylum. 
 
 
Who has authority? Member states versus Commission 
--------------------------------------------- ----- 
 
¶2. The lines between member state and Commission authority 
are contentious on most EU issues, but perhaps nowhere more 
so than in Justice and Home Affairs (JHA), where member 
states guard closely their sovereignty over the movement of 
people on their territory.  In broad terms, the Commission 
does not have competency (authority) over migration within 
the EU, but does have competency over numerous issues 
involving migration from outside the EU.  Internal migration 
is substantial, primarily from East to West, and can become 
contentious as when the "Polish plumber" became shorthand to 
describe the hundreds of thousands of Eastern Europeans who 
migrated West, primarily to the UK and Ireland, after 10 new 
countries joined the EU in 2004.  But it is primarily 
migration from outside the EU that raises difficult questions 
about Commission competencies and reveals differences in 
policies among EU member states.  The issue took on a very 
public face starting in 2005 when thousands of African 
migrants began arriving on European shores on rickety boats 
while others drowned en route.  The Commission responded by 
increasing its patrols through Frontex, the EU's border 
protection agency, and by reaching out to African governments 
to more closely monitor the movement of illegal aliens 
through their territory and to take back their citizens 
deported from Europe.  As a result, the number of 
undocumented migrants arriving in the Canary Islands, a 
favorite port of call for Africans, fell 70 percent from 2006 
to 2007, according to Frontex. 
 
¶3. The influx of African migrants and thousands of asylum 
seekers from Iraq brought to light differences both in the 
way EU member states treat migrants and the disproportionate 
burdens borne by those with southern coastlines.  Greece, 
Cyprus, Italy, Malta, Spain and Portugal have been at the 
forefront of calling for central and northern EU states to 
contribute money and consider burden-sharing to help the 
southern states cope with large numbers of arriving migrants. 
 The Commission has responded with several new pots of money 
designed to ease the financial burden on receiving states. 
The Commission is about to solicit member state proposals for 
$4.2 billion to be spent between now and 2013 for external 
border control, refugee reception and processing, migrant 
integration, and returns of deported migrants.  But there is 
no political will for burden sharing in the sense of having 
interior or northern states accept and process migrants who 
arrive elsewhere in the EU.  Each country is expected to deal 
with the migrants it receives.  Sweden, for example, notes 
that it may not be receiving many boat people from Africa, 
but it has processed half of the asylum requests from Iraqi 
refugees received by the EU.  In 2007, Sweden received 18,559 
asylum requests from Iraqis out of a total of 37,034 filed 
throughout the entire EU, according to UNHCR. 
 
¶4. On asylum, the EU is slowly moving toward a common asylum 
policy and expects to have full harmonization by 2010 (though 
Commission contacts say it is more likely to slip until at 
least 2012).  In the meantime, differences in policies have 
meant that asylum-seekers receive different treatment 
depending on where they file their claims.  The Dublin 
regulation, in an attempt to discourage asylum shopping, 
requires member states to return asylum seekers to the 
country of first entry within the EU.  But UNHCR in April 
publicly recommended that EU member states not return asylum 
seekers to Greece because of inadequacies in its protection 
and processing capabilities.  Greece approved 146 requests 
for asylum out of 25,113 received in 2007, according to UNHCR. 
 
Toward a common EU migration policy 
----------------------------------- 
 
BRUSSELS 00000701  002 OF 003 
 
 
¶5. The Commission plans to release a paper in June outlining 
the basic principals of a new common European migration 
policy.  France will assume the rotating EU presidency on 
July 1 and plans to shepherd the proposal through the 
political process with the goal of asking the European 
Council of Ministers to approve a common migration policy in 
October.  Some of the anticipated highlights of the common 
policy include the following, according to Commission 
contacts:  1) A prohibition on mass amnesties or 
regularizations of illegal migrants, which are seen as pull 
factors encouraging more illegal migrants to come.  Spain 
regularized the status of some 600,000 illegal immigrants two 
years ago, and a soon-to-be-released Commission study shows 
that the pace of illegal migration accelerated following that 
decision.  Member states will retain the option of 
regularizing the status of individuals on a case-by-case 
basis, but not in groups.  2) A framework for immigration 
governance, potentially including an oversight board that can 
evaluate policies and rules throughout the Union.  3) Sharing 
of best practices on integration of migrants with a goal of 
putting immigrants on a path to citizenship.  Current 
practice varies widely among member states.  France has 
proposed a mandatory "immigration contract" requiring 
individual immigrants to complete civics and language courses 
in return for financial support from the government. 
 
Commission initiatives 
---------------------- 
¶6. The European Commission currently is working on a number 
of labor migration regulations that flowed from a 2005 Green 
Paper noting that Europe, with its declining birth rates, 
needs to compete more vigorously with the U.S., Canada, and 
Australia for skilled migrant labor.  The proposed "blue 
card," modeled on the U.S. green card, would give EU 
residency permits to highly-skilled workers, harmonize the 
admission procedures throughout the EU, and spell out a 
common set of rights for legal migrants, according to 
Commission officials.  Other labor directives being developed 
target seasonal workers, internal corporate transfers, and 
paid trainees.  The Commission is not currently contemplating 
any directives for unskilled workers, according to Martin 
Schieffer, Head of Sector for Immigration at the EC's 
Directorate General for Justice, Freedom and Security (JLS). 
 
¶7. The Commission also has been working on a set of 
agreements governing the return of deported migrants and 
denied asylum seekers to their countries of origins  The EU 
is in the final stages of approving a "returns directive" 
that sets common deportation procedures for illgal 
immigrants in the member states and covers a re-entry ban for 
returnees, the amount of time a migrant can be detained while 
their ase is being reviewed, and provides safeguards for 
returnees.  The European Parliament and the European Council 
agreed on a compromise text for the Returns Directive on 
April 23, and Parliament is scheduled to consider it for 
approval on June 4-5.  In order to ensure that home countries 
will take back their citizens as well as those who transited 
their territory en route to the EU, the EU has negotiated 
formal readmission agreements with a number of countries of 
migrant origin.  Schieffer said such readmission agreements 
have a deterrent effect as shown by the sharp decrease in 
illegal migrants entering the EU through Albania once the EU 
negotiated a readmission agreement with that country. 
 
¶8. Another concept the Commission is working to implement is 
"circular migration," which grew out of an initiative by the 
Directorate General for Development to link migration and 
development.  The idea of circular migration is that 
employees from developing countries would work in the EU for 
up to several years, then go back to their home countries but 
retain the option to return to Europe to work in the future. 
It is much like the idea of seasonal workers, but has 
additional aspects like allowing the migrant to retain an EU 
residency permit for several years if he or she decides to 
return home for a trial period.  In theory, circular 
migration benefits the EU by providing it with labor, it 
benefits the migrant by providing him with income and 
marketability, and it benefits the country of origin by 
enhancing the skills of its workers.  In reality, it has been 
difficult to implement because it is more of a policy concept 
than an operational regulation, according to Commission 
officials.  The Commission is establishing two pilot projects 
called "mobility partnerships" with Moldova and Cape Verde 
that provide a legal framework for circular migration. 
 
Potential pitfalls 
------------------ 
¶9. As the EU moves toward its common migration policy, it 
faces considerable public skepticism about the added value of 
 
BRUSSELS 00000701  003 OF 003 
 
 
migrants.  Right-wing parties in Austria, Belgium, Italy and 
elsewhere have won electoral victories in recent years 
running on anti-immigration platforms.  Terrorist attacks in 
Western Europe by second- and third-generation immigrants 
raised questions about whether integration is working.  JLS 
Commissioner Franco Frattini, an advocate for a "European 
approach" to migration, recently announced that he will be 
stepping down, and it remains to be seen whether his 
replacement, Jacques Barrot, will embrace as fully the idea 
of an EU migration policy.  The UK, Ireland, and Denmark have 
all been historically wary of ceding sovereignty over 
migration issues to the European Commission and have opted 
out of many EU initiatives on borders, immigration and 
asylum.  On the other hand, the new Lisbon Reform Treaty 
currently being ratified will strengthen the Commission's 
hand in migration matters by removing the pillar system that 
required unanimous approval by the Council with qualified 
majority voting that requires codecision between the European 
Parliament and Council.  And the fact that France, with the 
backing of President Sarkozy, will be pursuing the common EU 
migration policy as one of its top presidency goals means 
that it will continue to be at the top of the EU agenda 
through 2008. 
MURRAY 
 
.