Malta's plea for burden sharing snubbed at Brussels summit

A two day summit in Brussels, attended by Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi ended this afternoon with EU leaders snubbing what was described as a "passionate plea" by Malta to have a burden sharing system accepted by European partners. Malta's call was backed by EU Commissioner Cecilia Malmstrom.

The EU leaders also rejected the proposal for a temporary exemption from the so-called Dublin regulation, which obliges member states to send back asylum seekers to the first EU country of entry, as proposed by the commission.

Instead they urgeed to "push forward rapidly" with work on so-called smart borders to keep track of all entries and exits of non-EU citizens and prevent visa overstay and allowing registered travellers to go through airport security by simply swiping their passports.

The decision to envisage re-introduction of internal borders in case of migratory pressure comes despite calls from human rights groups and commissioner Malmstrom herself to avoid going down that road.

"Solidarity, tolerance, and mutual respect between countries and people - I am saddened and concerned to see that these values risk losing respect and support around Europe," she said in a press statement ahead of the summit, warning of the risk of far-right parties rising and getting their agenda imposed in several countries.

"In my areas of responsibility – asylum, migration, integration, and border cooperation – I can see that xenophobia is on the rise. Developments this spring illustrate the situation quite clearly," she said.

The EU-27 agreed however to establish a "safeguard mechanism" allowing the re-introduction of internal borders in exceptional circumstances, potentially curbing one of the most integrative aspects of EU membership.

In the final text, a stronger evaluation of Schengen criteria is foreseen for all countries in the border-free area, but corruption is not mentioned.

"The future Schengen evaluation system will provide for the strengthening, adaptation and extension of the criteria (...) and should involve experts from the member states, the Commission and competent agencies," the conclusions read.

Without undermining this basic principle [of free movement of persons], we felt the need to improve the Schengen rules," European Council President Herman Van Rompuy said at a press conference at the end of the summit.

The mechanism would allow "as a very last resort, (...) the exceptional reintroduction of internal border controls in a truly critical situation where a member state is no longer able to comply with its obligations under the Schengen rules as concerns the prevention of illegal immigration of third country nationals, with negative effects on other member states," the final statement said.

The commission is supposed to work out the details of the arrangement by autumn.