The Effect of the Wuhan Coronavirus on the EU’s External Borders

The ChiCom flu has had a profound effect on Europe’s attitudes about mass migration. Not only are individual EU member states turning against it, but possibly even the mandarins in Brussels.

FouseSquawk has translated three articles about what’s going on. First, as reported yesterday in the Dutch daily De Dagelijkse Standaard, the migration industry has sensed an opportunity in the coronavirus crisis, and is trying to make sure it doesn’t go to waste:

Attention: Pro-migration lobby wants to use coronavirus to boost number of asylum-seekers

by Tim Engelhart
April 7, 2020

If it is up to advocates of open borders, the coronavirus proves one thing above all: that it becomes necessary to take mass numbers of migrants from abroad and provide them with a residence permit in Europe. “But what stands out to me most about this pandemic is that migrants and refugees offer part of the solution,” we read in Trouw (Faith) today.

Perhaps it sounds like a simple solution: there is a certain need in the job market. How can you fill it? Simple: just lure people from elsewhere to come here. They can then work for a low wage, and it’s done!

In any case, that was the thinking behind the guest workers of the ‘50s, ‘60s and ‘70s of the last century. We still regularly notice how this ended: Immigration and integration have been politically hot-button topic number 1 for about twenty years. The enthusiasm for unrestricted migration and loose migration rules has gone down over time. Figuring out the balance feels like asking a rhetorical question: Was filling the vacancies really worth all the problems of recent decades?

Now that the Corona crisis is running rampant, and it is only about health care, lovers of open borders see their chance. It is time to ship planeloads full of people to Europe again, they believe. Today in Trouw:

“Not only in Great Britain, but also in the rest of Europe, low-educated migrants are considered the least-desired migrants. In the last few years we have seen a very polarized and toxic debate over migrants. They get the blame for many problems. But what stands out most to me is that migrants and refugees can offer part of the solution.

“Because in this specific crisis, specific occupations are urgently needed. Take the fruit and vegetable pickers: Because of all the travel restrictions, in some places there is a shortage of people to cut asparagus and pick strawberries.”

Whether the current crisis will permanently change the view on migrants, Foresti cannot predict. “But I hope that the debate in the future will focus more on the role the migrants can play in our societies and economies.”

Therefore, pay attention to the coming time. It is not only the government that wants to use the Corona crisis to pass all kinds of unrelated things unnoticed through Parliament. The asylum lobby is clearly lurking.

The second article is from the Italian daily Il Giornale. The current left-wing government in Italy has yielded to the pressure of events and closed the country’s ports:

The government has closed the ports: “Italy is not a safe place”

From today for as long as the health crisis lasts, Italy cannot be considered a safe port: This is decreed by the ministries of infrastructure, foreign, health, and interior. NGO ships are stopped from entering.

by Mauro Indelicato
April 8, 2020

Italy is today officially not a secure port and won’t be at least until next July 31, the day of expiration of the state of health emergency, decreed last January 2020 by the council of ministers.

Decreeing this decision was the Ministry of the Infrastructure, in concert with those of the Foreign, Health and Interior: “For the entire period of the duration of the national health emergency coming from the spread of the Covid-19 virus,” the document drafted by representatives of the above-mentioned departments reads, “Italian ports do not assure the necessary prerequisites for the classification and definition of ‘Place of Safety’, in virtue of what is specified in the Hamburg Convention, in the search for and maritime rescue, for cases of rescue carried out by naval units flying foreign flags outside the Italian search and rescue area.”

Simply stated, Italian ports cannot be considered secure, being situated in a territory where one of the gravest health emergencies in recent years is being fought. Therefore the government has finally decided to put in black and white that which has been evident for weeks, namely, that our country is not able at this moment to offer reception.

And this, as far as is specified by international rules, is not by accident, noted in reference to the above-mentioned document and the conventions and treaties that regulate behavior at sea and that of navigation.

Perhaps it is not by coincidence that the document came out precisely at this time: In fact, for at least two days, an NGO ship, namely, the Alan Kurdi of the German Sea Eye has been knocking at the doors of all ports in our territorial waters.

On board the ship are 150 migrants, picked up in two separate operations in the central Mediterranean, and our authorities suspect that over the course of a few days, the German NGO could officially ask for entry into Italy. This will not be possible: Our ports cannot be considered, as previously stated, secure, and cannot take care of anybody.

Furthermore, with the coming warm season, an increase in the flow of migrants would be very dangerous for Italy: Re-starting the gigantic mechanism of reception, even for a few disembarkations, at a time in which only the emergency mechanism should be activated would be abundantly deleterious.

It would mean that men and rescue resources for the Covid emergency would be distracted and taken away in order to manage the disembarkations. Not only that: The authorities, at great effort, would have to start the search for facilities capable of sheltering the migrants in quarantine, not a simple circumstance as discovered in the disembarkations at Messina, last February 27 and that of Lampedusa in mid-March.

The port closures would, for the moment, protect our country at least until July 31 in respect to the migrant emergency, in expectation, hopefully earlier, that this health crisis may pass. An initial application of this decree took place in respect to the above-mentioned case pertaining to the Alan Kurdi: “Currently, due to the pandemic Covid-19 emergency, in fact, the ports no longer present the necessary sanitary prerequisites called for by the Hamburg Convention,” explained the ministers of Transport and Infrastructure in recent hours in a letter of response to the Sea Eye request. “It is what was established in the interministerial decree also signed yesterday by Minister Paola DeMicheli, who had also made similar decisions for cruise ships and passenger ships flying a foreign flag.”

“It is a decree inspired by the principles of protection of the health of passengers and equal treatment of Italian citizens,” continues the communication of the ministry, “to which the current ordinances have also prevented the movement from one municipality to another and dictated stringent rules for the re-entry from foreign countries.”

“To the German government, as a flag state,” further reads the ministry communication, “it is requested to assume the responsibility of every activity at sea, including the port of disembarkation, of the Alan Kurdi, which at this moment, moreover, has not yet entered into Italian territorial waters. In the certainty that Germany will maintain its commitments, the Italian Executive branch is prepared to collaborate, and the Ministry of Infrastructure and Transportation, in concert with the Ministry of Health, to intervene if necessary, also using its own means, according to the principles of solidarity and fraternity, with which the nation has always confronted these emergencies.”

Finally, De Dagelijkse Standaard reports that the EU may close all of its external borders:

Will the EU finally do something sensible? EU may close all borders to non-EU citizens

by Bart Reijmerink
April 8, 2020

We very well may experience something unique during this crisis. The Eurocrats in Brussels may decide to close all borders to non-EU citizens. It may well be time, as for weeks, the EU was painfully quiet during this pandemic, but now they are making themselves heard!

The European Commission has come up with a remarkable proposal: they want to ban all non-essential travel for non-EU citizens through May 15. This because we have not yet gotten the crisis within Europe under control.

Ultimately, it is the member states themselves who decide, but when we look at our fellow EU-member states, it doesn’t look like a bad plan to keep the borders closed for another five weeks. The most important priority is to get the coronavirus under control.

Italy was already busy putting a temporary end to the humanitarian aid of the asylum-boat industry. It is not a crazy idea to close all the ports and borders of the EU.

“All member states have put successful regulations into effect to limit social interaction and to slow the spread of the virus,” says Vice Chairperson Margaritis Schinas of the European Commission. Though the first results are “encouraging”, the travel restrictions, according to him, remain necessary. “We must not open the door while we are making our own house safe.”

13 thoughts on “The Effect of the Wuhan Coronavirus on the EU’s External Borders

  1. I am impressed by the Italian resolve. Either the ruling party is maneuvering to take away an issue from Salvini that the vast majority of the populace is clearly in favor of, or they might actually truly believe it. Possibly, this course of action could be aimed at the Fourth Reich since the particular offending vessel is registered there, and the current Fuehrer is in opposition to measures that would help the Italians deal with the Chinese Virus.

    Anyway, nice to see the bullies in Brussels hoisted by their own petards for once.

  2. “Perhaps it sounds like a simple solution: there is a certain need in the job market. How can you fill it? Simple: just lure people from elsewhere to come here. They can then work for a low wage, and it’s done!”…

    Alternatively, some of the large amounts of newly-unemployed locals can help fill it. (shock, horror – I know)…

    Like this 747 pilot, who now became a delivery driver: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8191031/British-Airways-pilot-work-coronavirus-Tesco-delivery-driver.html

  3. “but possibly even the mandarins in Brussels.”

    If there’s any sign they are making such noises it will be nothing more than a feint in order to continue their real agenda.

    In short, do.not.trust.ever and they simply have to go.

    By whatever means works.

  4. What nonsense is this.
    The EU thinks that the immigrants came to Europe in order to work to become vegetable and fruit pickers and with low wages?
    Here they insist on living like the Europeans although they do not have the qualifications for that.
    They demand housing,car,white women and generally to live like the natives.
    As for working? They rely on the allowances from the state.
    That is why they do not want to stay in Greece because our country does not give a good allowance to the unemployed.
    They all aim for Germany and the other north countries.
    The solution is Deportation,of all of them, otherwise we will see bloodshed.

    • Bloodshed is inevitable. It is the regular people who will have to start driving them out.

  5. There seems to be some confusion between different groups of potential migrants. Here in the UK, our farmers have for many years relied on seasonal workers from, mainly, Romania and Bulgaria (still fellow- EUmembers for now), to pick fruit and vegetables; without them, much food would go to waste. Because of the difference in the cost of living and relative value of currencies, and the free accommodation, they can send money back home, while it would not be worth the while of native Brits to do the same work.

    Of course such workers should be quarantined before starting work, but it really shouldn’t be a big deal.

    • There is no problem with immigrants from European christian countries,the problem is the immigrants from countries of Islam,because they do not come to work but they become a financial burden ,and their plan mainly is the spreading of their religion which actually is not a religion but a political system.

  6. Canada supposedly has “closed its borders”, but flights full of Chinese continue to arrive each day.

    • One would have thought that we would know that by now. Diversity drinking drugs, medications, sex changes and universal pay is not exactly a great strategy for survival.

  7. Order out of chaos. But what if the chaos genie won’t go back in the bottle?
    Interesting times indeed.
    The imported disease vectors are part of the great replacement.
    If you don’t stand up to vibrant diverse enrichers then you will be viewed as a feet wiping rug.

    • If you look like you are well and truly divided and becoming less and less able to stand up to anything more and more. That’s not a good thing is it? Out of the jungles and deserts getting all the goodies without murmur. Time flies. It might be over before we know it.

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