Now EU Plans to Bribe Countries with Their Own Money to Take Boat Migrants

The European Commission has announced plans to bribe member states with their own money in a bid to cajole them into accepting migrants from across Africa and the Middle East. The scheme has already attracted widespread criticism not only for economic reasons, but due to the opportunities it presents terrorists wanting to enter Europe.

The commission wants to see 60,000 migrants, 20,000 of whom have not yet even reached the EU, relocated across the member states. To that end, it has promised to pay the countries £4,250 for each person they accept, costing European taxpayers a grand total of £35.5 million, the Daily Mail has reported.

So far Britain has managed to negotiate an opt-out from taking a portion of the 40,000 migrants, the majority from Syria and Eritrea, currently stranded in Italy and Greece having successfully crossed the Mediterranean. But the government is still under pressure from the Commission to accept some of the 20,000 migrants from non-EU countries that it wishes to disperse across the bloc under a quota system.

A British Government spokesman said: “We do not oppose resettlement in principle, but we believe such schemes are best decided at national level and have no plans to contribute to an EU quota.”

Yet the EU has already issued a press release showing that the UK is in line to take 2,309 people in from outside the EU over the next two years under “resettlement” plans. {snip}

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The plans were being drawn up even as commission spokesman Natasha Bertaud told reporters that new migrant centres due to be built in African nations this year were first and foremost for the purpose of turning would be migrants around before they embarked on a perilous journey across the sea.

Ms Bertaud said the policy was about “building up capacity to take migrants back,” adding that “no remote processing” of asylum seekers would take place at the centres. However, she did admit that part of the centres’ work would be identifying those “in clear need of international protection, such as Syrians or Eritreans,” so that the UN could request that the EU take them in.

Germany, which backs the proposals, is set to take the largest number of people, relocating 8,763 from Italy and Greece, and a further 3,086 from outside of the EU. Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere welcomed the announcement saying: ‘You can negotiate the allocation. It won’t be easy but the way is right.”

France and Spain are both preparing to take in thousands, with 9,127 people destined for France, and a further 5,837 heading to Spain. {snip}

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