EU faces rising immigration problem

AN estimated 80,000 people in West Africa are currently preparing to migrate illegally to Europe —and that situation is going to get worse, according to a senior member of the European Parliament.

French MEP Patrick Gaubert said there were some 50,000 people waiting for a chance to leave from Mauritania, a further 20,000 in Senegal and the rest from other unspecified countries.

“The phenomenon is going to get worse,” Mr Gaubert, vice president of the European Parliament’s Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs, told reporters.

He was speaking during a visit by 12 European deputies to Spain’s Canary Islands. The islands off the north-west coast of Africa have received nearly 10,000 migrants from Africa, who have arrived by fishing boat so far this year. The total number last year was 5,000.

Many take to the seas in flimsy boats and more than a thousand are estimated to have died in their attempt to reach the Canaries.

Last month, a yacht carrying the corpses of 11 African men was found in Barbados, after drifting across the Atlantic. It is thought that many others on board fell overboard when the boat encountered heavy Atlantic storms, during an attempt to reach the Canaries from Cape Verde.

Traditionally, the immigrant boats have come from Morocco, but recently other routes have opened up from Mauritania and Senegal.

The president of the Canary Islands, Adan Martin Menis has asked the EU to invest more in developing the economies of its African neighbours.

“We have asked for help to see how to solve the problem of the minors,” Menis told a news conference, saying about 400 children had arrived recently.

He said he needed help to train these children so they could contribute to developing their country when they went back.

More and more children are arriving illegally in the Canaries, and Spanish legislation obliges the authorities to take responsibility for them.

The EU deputies visited camps holding intercepted immigrants while they await almost certain repatriation. The visit was part of a tour of countries receiving immigrants such as Italy, Malta, France, Greece and Poland.