The cross : Is Europe barricading itself?
Fabrice Leggeri: The management of external borders is not limited to migration aspects. It includes the fight against crime, terrorism, health risks, as we have seen during the pandemic. Our mission is also to make life easier for legal travellers, because we don’t want to build a fortress Europe. What we want is to keep the Schengen area of free movement alive. And to do that, you need external borders that work properly.
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Does this imply strengthening the policy of returning illegally staying foreigners to their country?
F. L. : Removal has been part of the agency’s mandate since 2011, but until 2015-2016 it was not highlighted. In 2021, we removed 18,000 people from the EU, compared to 16,000 in 2019, including an increased share of voluntary returns. All categories combined, this represents approximately 10% of all removals. At the end of January, for the first time, we chartered a return flight entirely led by Frontex. It started in Madrid, with a stop in Rome, heading for Albania. It will continue. The agency has a permanent presence in the airports of Rome, Frankfurt, Amsterdam, Vienna, and we are working with the French authorities to establish it in Paris.
Belarus used migrants in the summer of 2021 to destabilize the EU. What has changed for Frontex?
F. L. : That “hybrid threat” of inciting migrants to enter the EU illegally to exert political pressure is older: the first large-scale example took place between Turkey and Greece, in February-March 2020. Frontex, which had sent military forces ‘rapid intervention’, was then the victim of repeated maritime incidents.
The use that Alexander Lukashenko (the Belarusian president, editor’s note) in fact made it possible to take a step forward in the awareness of this threat, including among those who did not want to believe in its existence. Lithuania very quickly requested the intervention of Frontex. It is the second country to do so after Greece.
Why didn’t Poland ask for anything?
F. L. : Very quickly, last summer, Polish soldiers were dispatched to the borders. The hybrid threat has turned into military tension with Belarus. I remind you that Frontex is a civilian agency. We must carefully weigh the risk that a border guard finds himself caught in a confrontation of this type. How should I react when my officers in uniform, armed with their service weapon, are threatened? I don’t have the answer because it is political in nature.
Do we need, as Emmanuel Macron proposes, a “Schengen Council” to make decisions?
F. L. : The French president’s proposal to have political governance comparable to that which exists for the euro zone, with the competent ministers, reassures me. I have the feeling that things are moving forward, that there is an awareness that border management is not just a technical matter.
What is there to clarify?
F. L. : Some speak of “refoulement”, but it is not a legal concept. The Schengen Code prohibits crossing EU borders outside of crossing points. At the same time, there is a principle that a person seeking international protection must have access to it. Does that mean you can cross illegally? The answer obviously depends on the asylum policy, because if there is none, the balance between the two rights is broken.
How to ensure this balance between the two rights at sea?
F. L. : Frontex has been accused of maritime pushback, with videos, all of Turkish origin, relayed by a number of organisations. Interceptions are legal, when we are not dealing with a boat in distress but maneuvering to play cat and mouse. In this case, either we apprehend the boat and its crew to stop it, or we give it the order not to stay on course in territorial waters. The priority to save lives is very clear. In five years, Frontex has rescued 330,000 shipwrecked people.
What about land borders?
F. L. : It’s the same logic. Lithuania passed a law this summer making it compulsory to seek asylum at border crossings. The border guards were instructed, when crossing illegally, to make a “entry prevention”. Opinions of monitoring fundamental rights tell me that it is illegal (1). But who am I, the director of an operational agency, to tell Lithuania, Poland, and tomorrow France, that they are not respecting the legal order of the EU?
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It is up to the European Commission, guardian of the Treaties, to initiate infringement proceedings, and to the Court of Justice of the EU to rule. This is what has been done in Hungary, where provisions of the asylum and migration law have been found to be non-compliant. I drew the consequence, by suspending our operations there.