Migrations

source: Huffington Post Quebec, Les Blogues, 30/8/2018

author: François LaRochelle

translation: doxa-louise

François LaRochelle was a Canadian Diplomat, and is currently a Fellow

with the Institut d’études internationales de Montréal (UQÀM).

MIGRATIONS: the issue is planetary

The United Nations’ agency responsible for refugees estimates

at 66 million the number of people currently displaced in the world; the highest 
number ever recorded.

                               Bangladesh had to deal with a massive number of Rohingya
                               refugees. The largest refugee camp in the world is now established
                               there, a half-million people.

The migrations question has become a major election issue in a number of

countries. Be that in Europe or North America. Without forgetting Asia or the 

Middle East. The massive arrival of migrants has caused division in the European 

Union. Welcoming one million and a half refugees from Syria and neighboring 

lands has put in peril the political survival of Chancellor Angela Merkel.

With our Southern neighbors, politicians have used immigration to demagogic ends.

In Hungary and Poland, one evokes the ‘protection of Christian civilization’

against the ‘hordes’ of Muslims to refuse entry to refugees. One might think oneself

back to the time when the Ottoman Empire was at the doors of Vienna! In

Austria and Italy, governments have been put together as a function of 

anti-immigration views.

Millions of displaced people

In total, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) estimates

at 66 million the actual count of refugees or displaced persons in the world. Thus

the highest number ever known. The reasons behind this are numerous: wars in the

Middle East, violence and crime in Central America, poverty in Africa, genocidal 

practices in Burma, etc. The most recent crisis has seen two million Venezuelans

leave their countries and seek refuge in neighboring countries and even all the way 

to Chili.

«Climate change will cause droughts and flooding, which will force populations 

to leave their lands for a better life or even survival.

Unfortunately, these statistics will only get worse. Not necessarily because conflicts

will multiply, although, but certainly because climate change will cause droughts and 

flooding, which will force populations to leave their lands for a better life or even 

survival.

The UN in a recent report predicts that 800 million citizens of Asia (Pakistan and India,

in particular) will be negatively affected by higher temperatures. These countries

quite obviously are not equipped to deal. Lack of rain is bad for crops in Central America, 

pushing farmers toward the North. This is not about to reverse. Neither is desertification 

in Africa. It is predictable that increasingly difficult access to drinking water will 

destabilize the Middle-East even more, given a population in constant augmentation. 

Iran is grappling with this problem. Egypt, with 100 million inhabitants, has but the 

Nile to count on.

Looking for solutions to mass migrations

In order to allay the fears of an uneasy electorate, western leaders are looking for 

solutions. Thus the European Union has tried to stem the migrations from Africa

with financial aid to the countries of origin or transit, as is the case for Niger. With

a certain level of success, it would seem.

Brussels helps Libya repatriate its citizens. President Trump pummels the idea of a  

wall with Mexico and reinforces border controls, to the point of separating children 

and parents. Canada tries to convince Haitian or Central American communities that 

entering the country illegally will not lead to automatically getting refugee status. We 

are currently seeing fewer arrivals on the coasts of Europe, at the Mexican border and 

to Canada as well. But for how long?

«It is illusory to think richer countries will ever be able to halt the flow of 

migrants to their doorstep.

Given the problems caused by climate, the presence of incompetent leadership 

clinging to power as in Venezuela, Nicaragua, bloody regional conflicts and despair 

in African youth or that of the Maghreb who prefer risking their lives crossing the 

Mediterranean to dying a slow death at home, it is illusory to think richer countries 

will ever be able to halt the flow of migrants to their doorstep.

Thus, western governments will finally have no choice but to accept more migrants, 

chosen or not. And help them integrate. It is statistically impossible, notwithstanding 

what leaders or right-wing candidates might be saying, to carry on and believe they 

will be able to stop economic migrants and the oppressed from wanting a better life 

in our countries, legally or not.

The solution  would be, of course,  for the international community to act concretely to 

protect the environment, find solutions to regional conflicts and work for the economic 

betterment of the poorer countries. Unfortunately, this seems unlikely for the present 

given some of our leaders, the strengthening of nationalism for some, and the inability

of nations to work together in a progressively fragmented world.

«It is not with short-sighted projects, trying to complicate matters for migrants or 

their integration, that this issue will be settled.

It is not with short-sighted projects, trying to complicate matters for migrants or their 

integration, that this issue will be settled. This but pushes back the inevitable. We need 

an international strategy that goes beyond slogans or unfulfillable promises. There is 

no other choice.