EU Summit, Draghi-Sanchez axis on migrants?

The management of migratory flows towards the EU will not be on the agenda of the extraordinary European Council on Monday and Tuesday, but in Brussels the Prime Minister Mario Draghi and the Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez are expected to raise the issue at the table. 27. According to what is learned, the leaders, even if the agenda has not yet been set by Charles Michel and could change, should meet on Monday evening for dinner, physically at the Council headquarters in the Belgian capital (among other things, the summit will mark Mario Draghi’s debut in the European Council proper, after the informal in Porto) to discuss issues of international politics, in particular Russia, the Middle East and, if there is time, relations with the United Kingdom. On Tuesday morning, on the other hand, the heads of state and government should discuss the climate, in view of the presentation of the ‘Fit for 55’ package of the European Commission, the legislative proposals that will adapt the EU legislation to the goal of reducing polluting emissions of 55 % by 2030 compared to 1990 levels, and of the epidemiological situation, also in light of the agreement found yesterday between the European Parliament and the Council on the Green Pass, or Digital European Covid Certificate. The issue of migration should therefore not be formally on the agenda, but Italy and Spain are grappling with the resumption of irregular flows from North Africa and will bring the issue back to the table. Madrid sees important flows both from the coasts of West Africa towards the Canary Islands and in the enclave of Ceuta, on the Moroccan coast, stormed in recent days by thousands of migrants, encouraged to cross the border by the authorities of Rabat, in retaliation for the hospitalization in Logrono (La Rioja) of a leader of the Polisario Front, suffering from Covid. Italy has seen a resumption of departures from the North African coasts, in particular from Libya, towards the Sicilian coasts and the smaller islands, which are EU territory. Last September, the Commission presented a proposal for a new pact on migration and asylum which does not envisage a clear overcoming of the cardinal principle of the Dublin agreement, namely the attribution to the countries of first arrival of the burdens associated with migratory flows. The pact is under discussion, but it hasn’t come very far, so much so that Commissioner Ylva Johansson has publicly complained about the slowness with which the dossier is proceeding. According to qualified sources, it is very difficult to reach an agreement on a new EU migration and asylum policy before the summer. Enhanced cooperation, that is, a pact to move forward only between countries that agree, leaving dissenters out, could be a way to proceed and arrive at a solution after years and years of stalemate, but it is not an easy path. First of all, according to the treaties, there is an agreement between the 27 on the fact that closer cooperation should proceed. And then, even more importantly, it will be necessary to work hard to find an agreement between the countries of first arrival, those of the South, and the countries of destination of the migratory flows, which are those of Northern Europe. If the countries of the Visegrad group, in particular Hungary and Poland, block “everything”, as the secretary of the Democratic Party Enrico Letta said yesterday in Brussels, the heart of the agreement is observed in the Belgian capital, it must be found among the countries of the South and those of the North, before involving other states that are neither on the border nor are they the ultimate destination for irregular migrants. There is still no agreement between these two fronts on migration: for the countries of the North one of the crucial points is that of the control procedures at external borders, which, from their point of view, must go hand in hand with relocations.