BRUSSELS
\nMigration was at the top of the agenda as EU leaders met in Brussels on Thursday, with most governments keen to display a tough stance after hard-right gains in several countries, but little agreement on a course of action.
\nTalk of easing deportations, creating processing centers outside the European Union and speeding up implementation of a long-negotiated deal agreed on earlier this year have dominated the run-up to a summit that crystallized a rightward shift in the bloc\u2019s rhetoric.
\nItaly\u2019s hard-right Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni hosted a mini-summit in Brussels just ahead of the main event to discuss a common approach with 10 like-minded countries, including Denmark, the Netherlands and Hungary and Greece. EU chief Ursula von der Leyen was also present.
\n\u201cWe recognize that we need to think out of the box in order to address this pressing concern,\u201d Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis told reporters.
\nBut divisions remain among the bloc\u2019s 27 countries on the next steps, in particular a controversial idea of creating return \u201chubs\u201d outside the EU.
\nGerman Chancellor Olaf Scholz dismissed the concept as representing \u201cvery few small drops\u201d \u2014 and not a viable answer to the migration challenges of a large country.
\n\u201cIf we all followed the rules we have together, we would already be much further ahead,\u201d he said.
\nGermany is among nations that want an early implementation of a landmark migration pact struck this year, which hardens border procedures and requires countries to take in asylum seekers from \u201cfrontline\u201d states or provide money and resources.
\nBut others say the package, set to come into force in June 2026, falls short.
\nA majority have backed a proposal to expedite deportations of irregular migrants and explore other \u201cinnovative solutions,\u201d as Meloni posted on X on Thursday.
\nMeloni showcased the deal Rome struck with Albania to send some migrants there, according to her office. Other EU capitals have shown keen interest in the scheme, and von der Leyen has said the bloc will draw lessons from it.
\nFinding \u201csolutions\u201d to possibly return some Syrian refugees to Syria was also talked about, according to a diplomatic source.
\nDetected irregular border crossings into the European Union are down more than 40 percent this year after reaching the highest level in nearly a decade in 2023, according to EU border agency Frontex.
\nBut migration remains \u201cseen as a pressing and an urgent domestic issue\u201d by many EU nations, a senior EU diplomat said.
\nGermany, which is part of the bloc\u2019s Schengen free movement area, tightened border controls in September in response to several suspected Islamist attacks.
\nAnd this month Poland said it would partially suspend asylum rights, accusing Russia and Belarus of pushing migrants over the border to destabilize the country.
\n\u201cThere is a new wind blowing in Europe,\u201d said Dutch politician Geert Wilders, whose nationalist populist party came top in general elections in the Netherlands last year.
\nWilders was in Brussels to attend another event: a meeting of the far-right Patriots for Europe group in the European Parliament.
\nHard-right parties often riding anti-immigrant sentiment performed strongly in European Parliament elections in June, and have topped recent national and regional votes in Austria and Germany.
\nFrance also tilted to the right after a snap parliamentary election this summer.
\nBut whether the tough talk will result in concrete changes remains to be seen.
\nVon der Leyen kickstarted the process this week, promising changes to \u201cstreamline the process of returns.\u201d
\nIn a letter to the bloc, she mentioned the option of developing deportation centers outside the European Union.
\nBut an EU diplomat cautioned that the idea was \u201cvague and preliminary,\u201d saying there was no real plan for it at this stage.
\nDisagreement over what remains a subject fraught with legal and ethical issues caused a similar immigration overhaul effort to fail in 2018.
\n\u201cAll these solutions of \u2018migration hubs\u2019, as they are called, have never shown in the past to be very effective, and they are always very expensive,\u201d Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo told reporters.
\n\u201cWhat works are agreements with third countries, agreements that are broader than only on migration,\u201d he said.
\nThe EU has signed deals with Tunisia, Mauritania and others providing aid and investments in return for help curbing arrivals. They have been credited with reducing Mediterranean boat crossings but criticized for exposing asylum seekers to mistreatment.
\nUkrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky also attended the meeting to present Kyiv\u2019s \u201cvictory plan\u201d to defeat Russia, and EU leaders will discuss other topics, including Israel\u2019s conflicts in Gaza and Lebanon.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
BRUSSELS Migration was at the top of the agenda as EU leaders met in Brussels on Thursday, with most governments keen to display a tough stance after hard-right gains in several countries, but little agreement on a course of action. Talk of easing deportations, creating processing centers outside the European Union and speeding up implementation …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":64784,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-71813","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71813","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=71813"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71813\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":71833,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71813\/revisions\/71833"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/64784"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=71813"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=71813"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=71813"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}