ROME – The EU is working on a deal with Tunisia offering economic help in return for tougher efforts to stop migrants coming into Europe, a top official said ahead of a trip to the country today.
The EU Home Affairs Commissioner, Ylva Johansson, told Italy’s La Repubblica newspaper that talks were also already under way with Libya on a similar agreement.
Italy has called for help from EU nations to manage increasing numbers of migrants arriving on its shores, mostly from Tunisia and Libya.
Johansson said Brussels was working on organising “a network of voluntary aid” this summer until a more permanent EU solution on sharing migrants could be agreed, but “we are also working to block the departures”.
This includes trying to negotiate a new deal with Tunisia by the end of the year.
With Italian Interior Minister Luciana Lamorgese today, Johansson told the paper that she “will be... in Tunisia for a global agreement that on the one hand will allow the country to recover from the severe economic crisis caused by coronavirus, on the other hand to provide it with the resources to fight human traffickers,”.
She added that there “will be European funds for the economy, investment and employment, while the Tunisian authorities will engage in managing the borders, to take back their citizens who have left for Europe and to repatriate foreigners in their country who are not refugees."
She said the EU was also already talking with the Libyan government under Prime Minister Abdulhamid Dbeibah about a new agreement on migration from their shores, adding that the country’s December elections is not expected to delay said agreement. – AFP, May 20, 2021
