Rede des UN High Commissioner for Refugees vor dem Europaparlament, 10.11.2021 (engl. Originalfassung)
I appreciate the many very real challenges that mixed movements of refugees and migrants pose to asylum systems, in Europe and worldwide — made worse, very often, by the criminal action of traffickers.
And of course it is unacceptable that the dangerous onward movement of vulnerable people be encouraged by States. In this respect, yesterday, UNHCR and the International Organization for Migration (IOM) have appealed for an urgent resolution of the situation at the border between Belarus and Poland, and for immediate, unhindered access to people on the move, to ensure provision of humanitarian assistance, identification of those in need of protection and access to procedures in Belarus for those there who wish to seek asylum.
But looking at the broader picture in Europe, these challenges simply do not justify the knee-jerk reaction we have seen in some places. The irresponsible xenophobic discourse. The walls and barbed wire. The violent pushbacks that include the beating of refugees and migrants, sometimes stripping them naked and dumping them in rivers or leaving them to drown in seas. The attempts to evade asylum obligations by paying other States to take on one’s own responsibilities. Madame Vice President, the EU, a Union based on the rule of law, should and can do better and in matters of rule of law continue to be an example to others.
There is, Madam Vice-President, a way to manage those challenges. Not through rhetoric and demonization of ‘the other’, but by working together.
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Finding solutions also means cooperation among EU States to share the responsibility for those in need of protection within and amongst the Union.
And it means respecting the rule of law and the legal systems that exist and which I – and so many other proud Europeans – value as a foundational part of our social contract.
Die vollständige Rede finden Sie hier.