The migrant problem

THE Migrant Issue in Europe has been in the news for years. Many countries of Western Europe feel they are under siege from the relentless pressure of migrants fleeing war, persecution, famine and political repression trying to come into their countries. Italy has been under particular pressure since the Arab Spring erupted and sadly did not bring better times to the countries involved but instead civil war affecting everyone. Before that Spain was the country under most pressure with immigrants from the Sahel (Africa) taking rubber dinghies from Morocco to southern Spain. Despite pleas from these two countries and others the European Union gave only what is now seen as inadequate support.

There is a Dublin Accord but it is more like a bureaucratic approach that seems to be more concerned with formalities like documents that are difficult for migrants on the run to produce or refugees to acquire. This latter is what caused the unconscionable delay in getting the Syrian family that lost its mother, and two toddlers in a sea journey an immigrant visa. If their papers had been processed quickly enough they would have been able to arrive in Canada in the proper immigrant entry way as they had family there that guaranteed taking care of them including a bank account deposit. But for lack of one document supposedly from the Turkish government where they were given refuge, they were turned down. A document which apparently does not exist or is not issued by the Turkish government anyway. Here is where bureaucratic delay caused the tragedy that the world has shuddered to see in the photograph of the drowned Syrian 3-year-old boy.