Italian Prime Minister: Migrant crisis will harmonize EU laws

(Baonghean.vn) - The European Union's (EU) migration crisis will finally push the 28-member bloc to adopt uniform rules on migrants and end the patchwork practices that have made the situation more urgent, Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi said.announced on August 30.

Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi. Photo: Internet.

Hundreds of thousands of migrants, mostly from Africa and the Middle East, have flocked to Europe this year, many risking perilous sea journeys in the hope of finding refuge – at least 2,500 have died trying.

Europe's differing rules and confusing approach to dealing with asylum seekers have drawn widespread criticism, and a senior official admitted this week that the bloc has failed to come up with a common response.

Italy, the first destination for many migrants, has repeatedly complained that it is not receiving enough help from its EU partners to cope with the influx, but Mr Renzi told the Corriere della Sera newspaper that change is afoot.

“It will take months, but we will have a single European policy on asylum, no more individual policies,” he said, adding that the death toll from the crisis had pushed EU countries to confront the problem.

Renzi said the EU needed to have a greater presence in Africa and the Middle East to try to improve living conditions there and reduce migration. It also needed to make it easier for those denied asylum to return home. “It’s time for a political and diplomatic offensive,” the prime minister said.

Asked whether it was time to intervene in Syria and Libya, two countries currently at war, sparking a migration crisis, Renzi said only that US President Barack Obama had called for a meeting of heads of state next month on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly to discuss the issue, without providing further details.

Thu Giang

(According to Reuters)