Prime minister champions migration in stance at odds with European neighbours
Spain plans to make it easier for newcomers to settle, the prime minister said, promoting migration as an effective way to protect prosperity in sharp contrast with the attitude of much of Europe.
“Spain needs to choose between being an open and prosperous country or a closed-off, poor country,” Pedro Sánchez told parliament on Wednesday. “It’s as simple as that.”
Continue reading...Despite hostile political discourse about migrants, the numbers are steady, at less than 1% of total population
The number of irregular migrants living in the UK and other large European countries has not changed for years despite hostile political discourse about migrants overwhelming the continent, according to researchers.
Migration researchers from 18 of the world’s leading universities and research organisations including the University of Oxford have released the public database as part of the MIrreM project, which measures irregular migration.
Continue reading...Nearly 50 people dead and 108 unaccounted for after smugglers apparently force passengers into the water
More than 100 people are still missing after smugglers apparently forced migrants to leave their boats and swim in the Red Sea off the coast of Djibouti, the International Organization for Migration has said.
Forty-eight people have so far been confirmed dead after the incident on Monday, which involved two boats that had left Yemen for Djibouti with a total of 310 people onboard, said Frantz Celestin, a regional director at the UN agency. “Unfortunately, we have yet to account for about 108 of the migrants,” he said.
Continue reading...Risk found to be highest among black and north African people, as experts call for better mental health provision
People who migrate in adolescence have an increased risk of psychosis, researchers have found, noting the link is particularly strong among black and north African people.
While research has previously suggested migration could play a role in the increased risk of psychosis among people from ethnic minorities, the study suggests age could be an important factor.
Continue reading...Announcement that PM is returning gifts comes after news Labour peer Lord Alli is under investigation by Lords commissioner
Richard Fuller, the Tory chair, is on the conference platform now introducing the morning session.
He starts with thanks to various people who have helped with the conference.
After a frenetic Conference for Kemi Badenoch, James Cleverly, Tom Tugendhat and Robert Jenrick the tiredness will be kicking in, but also for the teams of advisers who want, and maybe need, their principal to take another go at delivering the twenty-minute speech of their career.
It’s a four hoarse race.
The problem for the party, and for me, is that none of this gossipy chatter has taken the conference attendees much further forward – nor has any of the four taken conference by storm.
Continue reading...Conservative leadership contenders Jenrick, Cleverly and Tugendhat reject rival’s comments, while Rosie Duffield criticises Keir Starmer
Q: Do you agree with Kemi Badenoch that some cultures are less valid than others?
Jenrick says culture matters. But he says he disagres with Badenoch on immigration numbers. He says he thinks you have to have a cap on numbers. And he also says he believes the UK has to leave the European convention on human rights. He says Badenoch is just talking about developing a plan in a few years time, and that’s “a recipe for infighting and for losing the public’s trust”.
Continue reading...At least nine dead and 48 missing after vessel carrying 87 people sinks off Spanish island of El Hierro
Rescuers renewed their search on Sunday for about 48 people missing after their migrant boat sank close to the Spanish island of El Hierro in what could become the deadliest such incident in 30 years of crossings from Africa to the Canary Islands.
Nine people, one of them a child aged between 12 and 15, have been confirmed dead in the incident in the early hours of Saturday morning.
Continue reading...Ex-president speaks in Prairie du Chien flanked by anti-immigrant posters and lobs insults at Harris and Biden
Donald Trump spoke on Saturday in the battleground state of Wisconsin, escalating his anti-immigrant rhetoric and taking his personal insults against Kamala Harris up a notch.
Trump’s speech in the small community of Prairie du Chien, where a Venezuelan in the US illegally was detained in September for allegedly sexually assaulting a woman and attacking her daughter, was unusually devoted almost entirely to undocumented immigrants. He wrongfully claimed that immigrants in the US are violent criminals, referring to them as “stone-cold killers”, “monsters” and “vile animals”.
Continue reading...Rescue services say they saved 27 of the 84 people aboard the vessel believed to have come from Mauritania
Nine people are confirmed drowned and at least 48 are missing after a boat carrying migrants capsized off Spain’s Canary Islands overnight, rescue services said on Saturday, the latest in a series of such disasters off the west coast of Africa.
Sea rescue teams said in a statement they had answered a distress call off El Hierro, one of the islands in the Atlantic archipelago, shortly after midnight. They managed to save 27 of the 84 people on board.
Continue reading...The bloc’s migration pact, finally agreed after a decade of talks, is already in peril as states outdo each other in efforts to get tough
In 2015, when more than 1.3 million people headed to Europe, mostly fleeing a brutal war in Syria, the response of Germany’s then chancellor, Angela Merkel, was to say “Wir schaffen das” (“We can manage this”), and open the country’s borders.
Less than a decade later, and faced with a flow of irregular arrivals less than 10% of what it was at the peak of the bloc’s migration crisis, EU capitals are increasingly saying, “No, we can’t”. Or, perhaps more accurately, “We won’t”.
Continue reading...Bill by Giorgia Meloni’s far-right government comes down hard on climate activists and migrants
Demonstrations are being held across Italy on Wednesday evening in protest against a new security bill described as “repressive” and “dangerous for the country’s democracy”.
The 24 laws contained in the bill, which passed its first hurdle in the lower house of parliament last week and now needs approval in the senate, is the latest attempt by Giorgia Meloni’s far-right government to get tough on law and order. It comes down especially hard on climate activists and migrants.
Continue reading...Trattoria Meloni contains 70 portraits of Italian PM and is near site where arrivals to the EU are processed
A restaurant dedicated to Giorgia Meloni has opened in the vicinity of a camp in Albania where the asylum claims of people who seek to enter the EU by sea will be processed as part of a controversial pact promoted by the Italian far-right prime minister.
Trattoria Meloni, a seafood restaurant in the northern port of Shëngjin, was opened by Gjergj Luca, a restaurant owner who is close to the Albanian prime minister, Edi Rama.
Continue reading...EU Commission says it will be sending independent observers to the country to investigate allegations of human rights violations
The European Commission can no longer ignore mounting evidence of the gross human rights violations against migrants and refugees in Tunisia, say MEPs and activists.
The EU has given millions of pounds to Tunisia to reduce migration from north Africa into Europe in a deal that pledges “respect for human rights” and piqued the interest of the UK prime minister, Keir Starmer.
Continue reading...Move by coalition headed by Geert Wilders’ Freedom party is unlikely to get a positive reception in Brussels
The new Dutch coalition government headed by Geert Wilders’ far-right Freedom party (PVV) appears to be on a collision course with the EU over immigration after formally asking Brussels for an opt-out on asylum rules.
“I have just informed the European Commission that I want an ‘opt-out’ on migration matters in Europe for the Netherlands,” the asylum and migration minister Marjolein Faber, a member of the PVV, said on X on Wednesday.
Continue reading...London-based doctor Tajwer Siddiqui says Home Office rules are separating him from his wife and Alina, 19
An experienced and highly regarded doctor who is working at a GP surgery in east London says he has no choice but to walk away from his job because the Home Office is separating him from his wife and autistic daughter.
Tajwer Siddiqui says he has found himself in this situation at a time when the number of full-time GPs in the UK is falling.
Continue reading...Investigation opens in France into deaths as David Lammy says UK could process asylum claimants in third country
Eight people died overnight trying to cross the Channel from France to England, French regional authorities have said, as the UK foreign secretary, David Lammy, said the government could follow Italy’s lead and process asylum claimants in a third country.
The French maritime prefecture said 59 people were onboard the boat, which got into difficulty off the coast of France, and 51 of them were rescued. An investigation has been opened by the Boulogne-sur-Mer public prosecutor’s office.
Continue reading...Document detailing ‘deterioration’ under Kais Saied will fuel concerns about bloc’s migration deal with his country
The EU fears its credibility is at stake as it seeks to weigh growing concerns about the crushing of dissent in Tunisia while preserving a controversial migration deal with the north African country, according to a leaked document.
An internal report drafted by the EU’s diplomatic service (EEAS), seen by the Guardian, details “a clear deterioration of the political climate and a shrinking civic space” under the Tunisian president, Kais Saied, who has suspended parliament and concentrated power in his hands since starting his term of office in 2019.
Continue reading...Polish PM calls for urgent consultations with European neighbours over controls he says will break European law
The Polish government is accusing Germany of acting unilaterally and unfairly over its “unacceptable” plans to introduce temporary controls into in the passport-free Schengen zone at all the country’s nine land borders, in what Warsaw says is a contravention of European law.
Donald Tusk, the Polish prime minister, said Germany had introduced a “de facto suspension of the Schengen agreement on a large scale” after the interior minister, Nancy Faeser, announced Berlin’s decision to confront what she called “irregular migration” by introducing spot controls along Germany’s 2,300-mile (3,700km) frontier after a recent spate of suspected Islamist attacks.
Continue reading...Belongings and tents removed, and residents bussed away, as part of official policy to deter coastal encampments
French police have cleared a camp believed to have been used by some of the dozen people, including six children, who died after their dinghy ripped apart in the Channel.
In the early hours of Wednesday, belongings and tents were removed and tens of people were bussed away from an unofficial refugee settlement near Calais known locally as the “BMX site”.
Continue reading...Organisations who try to save lives in Mediterranean say Sicily response showed what can be done
The tremendous resources and global attention dedicated to the tragedy of the Bayesian superyacht hint at a double standard for shipwrecks in the Mediterranean, several NGOs dedicated to assisting asylum seekers have said, citing the barriers they regularly face as they attempt to save lives in the same waters.
The groups that spoke to the Guardian were swift to express their regret and extend their sympathies for the deaths of seven people after the luxury vessel was hit by violent storms off the coast of Italy.
Continue reading...