As you can tell, I am fascinated by the sea change in Europe seemingly brought on in less than one week after Italy blocked the landing of a so-called ‘rescue ship’ with more than 600 mostly African men and boys on board.
The ‘Aquarius’ was ultimately “welcomed” by Spain, but that won’t solve the EU migration crisis where frontline countries get the brunt of the invasion unless Socialist Spain wants to keep them and all the future migrants who will surely head that way now.
For new readers to my ‘Invasion of Europe’ series, German Chancellor Angela Merkel created the recent migrant surge when she began ‘welcoming’ Middle Eastern and African refugees to Germany in 2015.
Germans aren’t producing enough children and she argues that they need young workers who would support old Germans in their dotage. Yeh right!, sure they will!
To get to Germany, of course, the illegal migrants must arrive in countries on the edges of Europe, countries like Italy and Greece, before fanning out throughout Europe. They head for Germany and Sweden, or stop along the way. But, many countries are erecting new border fences to save their own countries and cultures.
International refugee law says legitimate asylum seekers (economic migrants are not asylum candidates) must ask for asylum in the first safe place they reach (Italy, Greece, Spain etc). Those frontline states have had it with the enormous costs and social upheaval.
In a nutshell, the EU wants all European countries to share the burden. Many won’t.
(The situation in Europe is analogous to what is happening on the US southern border as Central Americans ask for asylum (vast majority are economic migrants), but should have done so in Mexico as they crossed its southern border. Hint to President Trump: pay close attention to the continuing migrant crisis in Europe!)
Now, complicating things for “Mama” Merkel—-an increasing number of Germans want their borders closed too!
Sorry, for being so long getting to the news of the day….
From EU Observer:
Bavaria rebels could unseat Merkel on migration
Local authorities in Bavaria, Germany, could start turning back migrants on Monday (18 June) in a rebellion that threatens chancellor Angela Merkel’s authority.
That was the upshot of crisis talks on Thursday between Merkel’s centre-right CDU (Christian Democratic Union) party and its Bavarian sister party, the CSU (Christian Social Union), who had previously stuck together since 1949.
The Bavarian ‘president’, the CSU’s Horst Seehofer, has said he has the authority to do it without her approval in his role as German interior minister.
He says people without IDs, or people who traversed another EU state to get to Germany, had no right to claim asylum there under EU law, which says the first point of entry into Europe is responsible for their care. [Salvini in Italy gets that, so turning away ships like ‘Aquarius’ is imperative as the migrants will only continue to pile up in Italy.—ed]
“Asylum tourism must end. Germany cannot wait endlessly for Europe, but must act independently,” Markus Soeder, the CSU’s Bavarian ‘prime minister’, said on Thursday.
Merkel: Migration is one of the big challenges for the EU. One! One! How about THE big challenge.
EU Observer continues….
Merkel urged them to hold off until EU leaders meet in Brussels on 28 June.
“I personally think illegal migration is one of the big challenges for the European Union, so I don’t believe we should act unilaterally, we should not act in an uncoordinated way and we should not act at the expense of third parties,” she said on Thursday, referring to the extra pressure that the CSU plan would put on frontline states Greece and Italy.
“I expect that we [the EU] will all do it together, the federal government included”, she said.
The June summit is unlikely to see a breakthrough on EU asylum reform, however, with the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, and Slovakia opposed to migrant-sharing.
The German population is also losing patience – 62 percent of Germans backed the CSU idea in a poll by German TV station ARD on Thursday, while 37 percent endorsed Merkel’s approach.
‘Merkel completely alone!’ Germany’s top tabloid, Bild, said in a headline the same day, highlighting the fact that several CDU members were also unhappy with the status quo.
If Seehofer goes ahead on Monday, that would leave Merkel with two choices, both of which could spell the end of her 13-year rule.
She could call a vote of confidence in herself in the Bundestag, risking a defeat and subsequent resignation, or she could sack Seehofer, destroying the CDU/CSU alliance and her parliamentary majority.
More here.
We will be watching because no less than the survival of Western Civilization in its birthplace is at stake.