Refugee situation / EU response - rolling news

what a world

http://mashable.com/2016/03/09/syrian-refugees-get-warm-canadian-welcome-at-furry-convention-in-vancouver/

omg

https://twitter.com/SLevelt/status/720654077315694592

A comic for about-to-be-deported refugee children on why being deported is actually really great.

Jesus!

That is truly revolting

http://www.wsj.com/articles/mainstream-hopefuls-lag-as-austrians-vote-for-new-president-1461495458

Voters in Austria’s presidential election Sunday sent a stern warning to the established parties that have ruled the country since World War II, making a populist, anti-immigrant candidate the front-runner.

Preliminary results published by the Austrian interior ministry, which didn’t include mail-in ballots, showed that Norbert Hofer, from the anti-immigrant Freedom Party, which is known by its German initials FPÖ, with 36.4% of the vote.

Alexander Van der Bellen, a 72-year-old economist and former spokesman for the Greens who took a pro-refugee stance during the campaign, secured nearly 20.4% of the vote, according to the ministry. Mr. Van der Bellen, himself a child of refugee parents, is opposed to all restrictions on asylum seekers.

Candidates from the Social Democrats and Austrian People’s Party, which together form the current coalition government, each received around 11% of the vote.

Mail-in ballots didn't change much, except that the SPÖ are now a tick ahead of the ÖVP. Will still be a run-off between the Fasc... uh I mean Freedom Party and the Greens, which means a referendum on foreigners (in Austria, it's always about foreigners, even when they say it's about refugees), which means I am wondering whether to renew my residence permit. I am not surprised by this outcome even though polling showed a much closer race between VdB and Hofer, because Austrians who hate foreigners are chicken shits who think the mean Americans will punish them for admitting their true feelings and are afraid even of pollsters; if polling shows a close race in the run-off, it will mean a landslide for Hofer.

The major parties have also been triangulating poorly by making Austrian immigration law progressively more incomprehensible and xenophobic over the last 10 years; folks clearly want the real thing. Pfui.

there are few things more dispiriting in the world than the European reaction to the refugee crisis and the consequences - new found hegemony of the xenophobic right in multiple countries - it will have for, the rest of our lives, i suppose?

The other thing that is wildly different about Austrian politics for people who know German politics: in Austria, a Grand Coalition always means failure and stagnation -- neither of the major parties wants it to be successful, so no coherent ideas come out of it. This has meant with this particular government in this crisis a Socialist Chancellor who talks about tolerance and openness vis-a-vis refugees with a black (I can't say Christian Democrat, the words get stuck in my mouth) Minister of the Interior who sets acts like she's part of Orban's cabinet and nobody does anything, no elections aren't called, and Austria just moved to a longer five-year cycle for standard terms of office.

Kenya has announced it is going to close the Dadaab refugee camp, the biggest in the world, and force the more than 300k people either back to their country or onto somewhere else

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/may/11/kenya-close-worlds-biggest-refugee-camp-dadaab

Run-off elections in Austria today: 50-50 results. Going to the absentee ballots. (Vienna did not vote for the Nazi, nor did, to my happy surprise, my tiny town.) Am cautiously optimistic as absentee ballots favor better educated voters, and clearest demographic trend here has been O-Levels Green, no O-Levels, extreme right.

Nazi loses.

NOW it's official 50.3 -- 49.7. The FPÖ are screaming -- keep your eyes on Austria in the coming months.

they're claiming fraud etc? else the usual indignation when the silent majority has failed to summon itself into existence

http://www.zugespitzt.at/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/csm_aufderuni2_a95509a9b0.jpg

Yes, they started hollering fraud yesterday, at which point I started relaxing a little.

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/05/25/why-are-so-many-muslim-refugees-in-europe-suddenly-finding-jesus.html

In Denmark it's apparently illegal to help refugees now. One politician let two immigrants sleep at her place for a night, after which they left for Norway. She's probably going to jail for it.

wtf

so i found a link, here: http://cphpost.dk/news/danish-politician-on-trial-for-harbouring-refugees.html

Where it says:

The charge sheet accuses the two defendants of allowing two African refugees to stay overnight at their home and then arranging transport and ferry tickets so they could travel on to Norway the next day.

You'll also notice that the informer was a conservative politician.

The Danish Alien Act says:

(7) Any person is liable to a fine or imprisonment for up to 2 years if he –
(i) intentionally assists an alien in illegally entering or transiting Denmark;
(ii) intentionally assists an alien in illegally staying in Denmark;
(iii) intentionally assists an alien in entering Denmark for the purpose of entering another country illegally from Denmark

the act is 3 years old

Australia is closing their refugee detention camp in PNG - or rather has been told to close it by the PNG supreme court and has agreed:

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2016/aug/17/manus-island-detention-centre-to-close-australia-and-papua-new-guinea-agree

But also: '“Both Papua New Guinea and Australia are in agreement that the centre is to be closed,” O’Neill said, but offered no time frame, only stating that the process should not be rushed." and "offered no detail on the future of the 854 men held there – except that Australia remains adamant it will accept none of the detainees for resettlement."

This is absolutely horrific.

The Greek government is taking migrants from detention centres, including babies, putting them on overloaded inflatable life rafts and abandoning them at sea for the Turkish Coast Guard to rescue https://t.co/qxgKcgksj8

— Abi Wilkinson (@AbiWilks) August 16, 2020

Christ.

It really, really is...

right wing on twitter already advocating for the uk to do the same, not going to link to it, nobody needs to see that

What can one say to this kind of evil? I think we’re way down a very dark path and I can’t see the way back.

no market or supranational body could unite europe like ethnic cleansing does

the remainers who shouted down any attempt to raise this issue are as bad as everyone else

the remainers who shouted down any attempt to raise this issue are as bad as everyone else

otm

Sadly, this is who 'we' are and who 'we' always have been. It's just another milestone in the Grand History of Humanity.

death to europe

Happy Easter 🐰 🐣 🌼 to all who celebrate it today, especially those who help to make Europe’s borders more secure!

This holiday weekend there are hundreds of people in Frontex operations far from home. They support countries around Europe to protect our borders. Thank you! pic.twitter.com/lKrwLJMze6

— Frontex (@Frontex) April 4, 2021

This is what a world of hard borders looks like, with its citizens employed as prison guards.

https://newleftreview.org/sidecar/posts/fortress-greece

#EU states are spending ludicrous sums of money on dystopian technology to deter #refugees and #migrants.#Europe #HumanRights #Morocco #Syria #Turkey #Libya @JustinSalhani https://t.co/DwFfR73zju

— Fanack (@FanackMENA) July 15, 2022

potentially stupid question from an American:

how much of the xenophobia / racism against refugees is centered around these people being "violent and dangerous" and if so, do the citizens of European countries find this rhetoric credible? (e.g. Trump's dog whistle campaign comment about Mexicans being bad hombres)

most of it, though at this point the necessity for ethnic cleansing is seen as so self evident that the case often doesn't need to be made. most of this stuff goes unreported and to question it is inherently politically extreme, unserious, elitist, antisemitic (somehow) and maybe treasonous. so people believe it (or pretend to) including most prominent liberals and leftists

Sarah - as the report in the NLR says, Islamophobia is playing a part in turning sections of the Greek population against refugees.

that's just horrible. ugh.

right-wing eejit P Hitch once wrote that the EU is a de facto continuation of the German Empire, it's probably not at all in the sense that he meant it, but not that far off from being that either if you look at the wider picture.

it's depressing in that one wants to think that civilizations and governments and people learn from mistakes and horror and get better ...and this just reminds me, 1945 wasn't that long ago.

also that America doesn't have a monopoly on egregious behavior like that

if the Cleves-Jülich crisis of 1609 taught us anything it’s that refugees streaming into your territory boost the economy, this is basic stuff

Mass deaths at sea are to the EU what mass shootings are to the US.

- It keeps happening.

- And every time, politicians pretend to be concerned.

- And every time, politicians keep in place the government policies at the root of the problem.

- And it keeps happening.

— Andrew Stroehlein (@astroehlein) June 15, 2023

https://jacobin.com/2023/09/europe-migration-tunisia-humanitarian-disaster-italy-asylum-seekers/