DAVID HERRERA on the complex dynamics of immigration from one transit country to another
A week ago, Malta was huffing and puffing at the astonishing remarks made by Italian Home Affairs Minister Roberto Maroni, who in a nuthsell accused Malta of having sent 40,000 immigrants to Italy.
All manner of conventions and international treaties were flung into the debate. But what galled local observers was the audacity of being attacked for not taking responsibility for a large number of immigrants, when Malta’s closed and open centres were already bursting at the seams.
That’s what you get when you’re a transit country: you are forced to deal with the pressure of incoming migrants, and you’re left with the problems when they manage to get through and get on with their journey.
It is estimated that 70% to 80% of the tens of thousands of Sub-Saharan Africans who attempt to cross the Mediterranean Sea each year pass through Libya. That’s a massive percentage, and it is debatable whether Libya is making sufficient effort to man its 1,500-plus kilometer coastline.
We should not be surprised, however, when our cries of shame are returned with a curt and analogous salute. For just as Malta was rightly irked by the cheek of the Maroni dossier, so too does Libya take exception to being treated as a country of origin when it is also, by nature, a transit country.
Open door policy
Like Malta, Libya’s geographical location in the Mediterranean region renders it a focal point for migratory movements northward, and its vast desert borders in the south do not help in stemming the flow.
Having said this, Libya’s large foreign population also derives from the policies it adopted during the 70s, 80s and 90s. The large recruitment exercises aimed at manning Libya’s oil fields following the 1973 oil crisis, and its positioning as the African pan-Arab leader with an open door policy during the 90s, are benchmarks in this sense.
Like Europe, however, Libya quickly became a victim of its own success, as racism and xenophobia become rampant. At the turn of the millennium, with murders and violence mounting, Libyan authorities had no option but to tighten regulations, detain and abuse immigrants, and repatriate thousands so that anti-immigrant sentiments would not escalate.
Today, Libya is inundated with immigrants attempting to gain access to the Mediterranean Sea through the East Africa migratory route, which passes through Sudan and Chad, and to the south through Nigeria, Niger and Burkina Faso.
And while it may be easy to blame Libya directly for the sudden increase in migrants traversing through Maltese waters, let us remember one of the two golden rules of migratory movement, being that once migratory movement has started it tends to sustain itself.
Indeed it is impossible for us to imagine a slowdown in the influx of illegal immigrants to Europe today, because of the enormous difference in quality of life and development levels between Europe and Africa. The flow of immigrants will not be quelled by enhanced security. A good example of this is the case of the movement of immigrants to the Canary Islands, which can plausibly be seen as an outcome of the tightening of security along the Straits of Gibraltar, which was in turn a very popular migratory route in the 1990s. A tightening of security will not reduce immigration. On the contrary, it will only promote a diversification of routes and means of entering Europe.
This brings me to the second golden rule of migratory movement, which is that the end result of migratory movement is always some form of settlement in the country of destination. So even if the immigrants originally intended to emigrate on a temporary basis, a certain degree of settlement is inevitable. And Europe itself is a shining example of this phenomenon.
No refugee policy
So is Libya, incidentally, to the extent that the fundamental flaw in Libyan policy is that it does not recognise refugees and asylum seekers, pitting all forms of migrants that enter its territory as economic migrants. Apart from its lack of refugee policy, Libya is not a signatory of the 1951 Convention on the Status of Refugees and its 1967 Protocol, although it can also be argued that certain provisions of this Convention feature in Libya’s Constitution.
By only recognising economic migrants, Libyan authorities can repatriate migrants at will. The deportation, sometimes en masse, of migrants raises serious concerns pertaining to refoulement and human rights violations. Asylum seekers cannot be repatriated to countries which are not safe havens for return; in such scenarios, potential refugees could be made subject to cruel treatment, torture and even death.
Libyan authorities know, however, that if they were to offer the option of application for asylum, they would probably be inundated with a new wave of irregular and undocumented migrants who utilise the asylum channel to avoid being repatriated.
But things are looking up. The coming months will offer excellent opportunities for Europe and Libya to come closer together. It is often forgotten that just five years ago, Gaddafi was considered to be the leader of a rogue state. The fact that the European Commission is currently negotiating a Cooperation Agreement with Libya under the European Neighbourhood Policy is a victory for diplomacy. Indeed, Libya is the last southern Mediterranean country with which the EU has no contractual relations.
To date, in fact, Libya has only ever signed formal agreements on the subject of migration with Italy on a purely bilateral level, with the most recent agreement being signed last February. Last Sunday Libya intercepted a boat carrying 200 immigrants en route to Italy; the spokespersons involved in the operation could not confirm what would become of the immigrants, and whether they would be detained or deported home.
If Europe were to understand Libya’s preoccupations, and translate those fears into financial and technical assistance, Libya would be in a better position to quell the potential onslaught of asylum applications once refugee status is properly defined in its law. Frontex would certainly take on a new meaning, and this would undoubtedly re-dimension the immigration paradigm in the Central Mediterranean.
David Herrera is author of ‘Irregular Migration and the Central Mediterranean: The Case of Libya’
Any comments?
If you wish your comments to be published in our Letters pages please click button below. Please write a contact number and a postal address where you may be contacted.
Download front page in pdf file format
All the interviews from Reporter on MaltaToday's YouTube channel.
