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October 15, 2024 - 10:00am
Donald Tusk shocked Europe this weekend, but for completely different reasons than anyone might have imagined. Poland’s Prime Minister, formerly European Council president, announced that his government would be “temporarily” suspending migrants’ right to asylum, a cornerstone of international migration law. He backed this up by claiming the procedure had been abused by Belarus and Russia in its ongoing hybrid war against Poland. The concrete benefits of such a move for Poland’s security remain muddled — but its impact on European migration discourse cannot be overstated.
Tusk’s decision, which apparently surprised even his own governing coalition, comes after months of a steady hardening of Poland’s migration policy. This has accelerated following an incident in June, when a Polish soldier was killed by someone — a migrant, a smuggler, or even perhaps an undercover Belarusian servicemember — on the opposite side of the country’s border fence with Belarus. Since then, Tusk’s centrist government has reinstated a military exclusion zone along the border that had initially been implemented by his political rivals in 2021, broadened permissions for security services to use firearms along the border when confronting migrants, and boosted efforts to build a wall of fortifications along Poland’s borders with Russia and Belarus.
While asylum claims have risen in Poland in the first half of 2024, most have come not from non-European groups who make up the bulk of irregular migrants on Poland’s eastern border, but instead from Ukrainian and Belarusian nationals. Unless there is something we don’t know, Tusk’s latest move — like much of his shift on migration issues since his government took power late last year — is almost certainly motivated primarily by domestic political concerns. The border issue is one of few topics on which most Poles largely agree — 86% of the population stated in a July survey that they were in favour of allowing soldiers along the border to use lethal weapons when necessary to deter hostile individuals.
With a presidential election looming next year, Tusk’s new pronouncements on the issue constitute an effort to solidify support across Poland’s political spectrum at a time when his government is undertaking a highly divisive effort to rein in the legacy left by his predecessors, the Right-wing Law and Justice Party. Tusk’s Foreign Minister, Radosław Sikorski, admitted as much last month, saying he didn’t think their party would have defeated Law and Justice had they not “outflanked” their rival on migration.
But the immediate consequences of this latest move have already been felt far beyond Poland, and have triggered warnings from the European Commission. This is not the first time that an EU member state has suspended the right to asylum as a result of Kremlin hybrid activity — Finland voted to refuse entry to asylum seekers at its crossings with Russia last year. However, for a Brussels insider like Tusk to take such a step has sent shockwaves across the continent’s establishment, showcasing just how far the pendulum has swung on migration in the EU. Gone are the days when far-Right firebrands were the only ones calling for the suspension of internationally accepted human rights in service of border security. What had once been unthinkable in Europe has become near-mainstream overnight.
That not even Law and Justice had openly advocated for a similar move showcases just how much the ground has shifted under not only Tusk, but also the European institutions he has come to represent in the span of a few short years. In many ways, his adoption of such a radical position is an admission that advocates of fundamental changes to European — and perhaps even global — migration policy can no longer be ignored, and that fears of threats to national sovereignty, real or perceived, have decidedly trounced concerns about upholding liberal values for the continent’s voting majorities. Where Tusk’s decision will take the EU remains murky, but it’s clear that Europe will never be the same again.
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SubscribeNot surprising that the majority view on uncontrolled immigration is finally filtering thru into mainstream politics, despite the misguided view of the liberal elite.
It’s not going to get any less restricted either, as global chaos continues. The answer is not simply to shift large parts of the population of disfunctional countries to the West, as if that had no practical consequences!
Tusk has probably realised several things:
That failing to take account of the view of the majority (which is now clearly against legal migration), while merrily calling them stupid/racist for their concerns and wringing your hands over the resulting rise of parties who do (purport to) offer solutions or at least listen is not the way forward here.
That it is not sacrificing our liberal values to try and stop people from the Middle East and Africa (who have travelled across several safe countries or even taken a flight to Minsk) coming over the Belorussian/Polish border to claim asylum in Europe.
That this is not “asylum” at all in such cases, but economic migration and a widespread abuse of our system and our rules in order to nab a better life. Having sympathy for that aim does not make the first sentence of this paragraph any less true.
That failing to get control over this free-for-all will result in the entire asylum system in Europe collapsing because acceptance among Europeans will simply be destroyed. And believe it or not, our opinion matters.
So liberals need to ask themselves what they want: a pragmatic approach which keeps one of the biggest European achievements alive but which requires a tough crackdown, or the complete loss of the same because your demands and expectations exceeded what was politically or practically possible?
(PS: the security argument is a straw man. Germany has introduced border controls on its eastern border and the Poles just don’t want to get the splashback.)
What achievement is that?
That this is not “asylum” at all in such cases,
^^^^^That comment. Very few cases involve genuine asylum seeking. The term has become a catch-all that allows a way to demonize anyone who protests against immigration.
Good. Asylum has been so bent and twisted that it is unrecognizable. The term does NOT speak to illegal entry into a country whose way of living you despise. It does not speak to illegal entry period. The first priority of any national leader must be his/her citizens. Period. Full stop. Any migration that occurs must be to the benefit of the host nation, not the convenience of the immigrant. One would think this truism would be blindingly obvious by now.
Internationally accepted human rights? Don’t see it. Migrants illegally crossing frontiers is not a human rights issue but a law and order issue. Poland is in a special situation, and quite recently Russia was said to have sent plane loads of economic migrants to Belarus so that they can cross into Poland, a novel kind of unarmed invasion. There is no international law that says this is ok.
These international laws and norms mean nothing to anyone, other than a small segment of technocrats and lawyers in western democracies.
“We [must] wake up and understand that we have to protect our territory, our borders, that if we are open to all forms of migration without any control, our world will collapse.”
Tusk said this earlier this year, according to Unherd. If so, he appears to understand. Some understood decades ago. Others are now catching up…it’s a zombie apocalypse.
“Tusk’s latest move … is almost certainly motivated primarily by domestic political concerns. The border issue is one of few topics on which most Poles largely agree …”
Indeed. Tusk has been an EU enthusiast, but it is interesting to see divergence across the EU in just this last year or so in approaches to immigration. The Irish continue to vote in coalitions that favor heavy immigration. The UK has done the same. But, the pro-immigration coalition in Germany has started to make noises about being less accommodating to immigration after recent regional elections in the German East. Sweden has stepped back; Hungary has always annoyed the EU leadership on this matter; Slovakia has followed Hungary, but now the usually reliable coalition in Poland is itself stepping back.
What does this mean? Was a Polish soldier killed inside Belarus? That is how I read this passage. If so, what was a Polish soldier doing inside Belarus?
If it was in Polish territory, just say so.