The unprecedented wave of migrants that has swept Europe in recent months is now affecting the relations between European nations, since no one seems to be willing to address the issue of accommodating them. This crisis has become a mental shook up for the European society and has ultimately made the most sensible part of it to question the reasons of this modern-day exodus. Yet, those responsible for the crisis seems unwilling to bear the moral and financial responsibility for its consequences.
According to the European border agency Frontex, more than 500 thousand migrants have already arrived to Europe this year and this number may easily exceed one million mark before the year is through. The International Organization for Migration seems to be more precise, according to its report 464,876 migrants have crossed the Mediterranean sea to seek refuge in Europe since January 1st, while 2,800 died in an attempt to reach their goal. Geographic origins of migration exceeds the boundaries of Syria, Libya and Iraq, including Mauritania, Morocco, Tunisia, Mali, and Nigeria. Therefore, it’s not simply the Middle East, but the whole North Africa is now suffering the consequences of the Western aggression and artificially induced “revolutionary processes”.
Russia’s foreign minister Sergei Lavrov has recently stated that the “mechanical approach” to the refugee crisis will not work, since its origins are purely political. The head of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs is convinced that “Justice requires that countries which are guilty in the outbreak of conflicts are more responsible for the donation of humanitarian aid.”
A representative of the of the National Committee of the German Left Party and a Bundestag member Sahra Wagenknecht along with a number of her colleagues have labeled this crisis a direct result of Washington’s actions, since it has been destabilizing entire regions and supporting killers like the Islamic state members, which are still receiving indirect support from German allies. For this reason Sahra Wagenknecht urged the German government to demand compensation from the United State. In her speech she stressed the fact that if the German government had a shred of courage, it would have required Washington to at least provide financial assistance to allow Europe to deal with the current situation.
Marine Le Pen, the president of the French National Front in an interview to the RTL radio station stressed the notion that migrants are fleeing death, which was brought to their homes by Western governments. These major migratory flows were provoked by numerous evil acts, including the intervention in Libya. Marine Le Pen is persuaded that it was Nicolas Sarkozy who, with the support of François Hollande, brought Islamic fundamentalists to grace. Now there’s chaos, disorder, barbarism and death everywhere in the Middle East, but the president of the French National Front seems reluctant to adhere to the “let’s sit and wait” tactics.
Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi in an interview with Corriere della Sera has also stated that European authorities bear responsibility in the migrant crisis since they played a crucial role in toppling the former Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi in 2011, that was brutally murdered shortly after his fall.
However, instead of bringing to justice those responsible in the ongoing humanitarian catastrophe, the sitting European authorities have developed a plan of forced expulsion of tens of thousands of refugees to special camps, that are now being built, reported The Guardian.
Of course, such “plans”, as well as attempts by certain political forces in Europe to deal with the flow of migrants and not the root cause of this problem will only lead to the rise of Islamophobia in Europe. To justify this irresponsible position European leader are trying to push blame on the oil-rich Arab states, by accusing those of reluctance to provide refuge to their fellow Muslims.
Back in February the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees António Guterres has already been demanding Middle Eastern states to accommodate Syrian refugees, by claiming that they should “follow the example of Germany and Sweden”. Similar calls were being made in Brussels, for instance German Vice-Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel after a trip to the Middle East last spring, urged the Arab world to improve the living conditions of Syrians and Libyans refugees. Later on, Amnesty International criticized the Middle Eastern countries for closing their borders for those seeking asylum. The human rights watchdogs were persuaded that those countries would be able to provide refuge to those fleeing from war, since linguistic and religious similarities make former Syrians and Libyans feel “more at home” in those states.
There’s little doubt that the Gulf monarchies that have been providing financial assistance to militant terrorist groups, including the Islamic state, are guilty of the fact that hundreds of thousands of people in Syria, Iraq, Libya lost their homes and were forced to flee. However, as it has been evidenced by the official statistics, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon and Turkey have already accommodated more than four million refugees.
Migrants have already become the backbone of the local labour force in the Gulf states. And since those states didn’t have large populations in the first place, all opportunities to provide refugees with occupation have already been exhausted there. In addition, refugees are not accepted in certain states due to safety reasons, since governments like those of Saudi Arabia are afraid that their territory will be infiltrated by radical elements.
One shouldn’t forget that those monarchies are dominated by the arrogant rich that are dismissive towards migrants from other Arab countries, they are persuaded that their monarchies are “feeding the entire Arab world”. Therefore, many migrants choose to avoid the Gulf states, because even if they were able to get a job there, as a rule, they would have virtually no rights.
There’s a chance that Persian Gulf monarchies could be affected by the White House, but Washington couldn’t care less about this “whole refugee mess”, since the humanitarian crisis that was provoked by the US policies in the Middle East is now weakening Europe financially, which will only help America to escape the ongoing global crisis.
Vladimir Odintsov, political commentator, exclusively for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.