Report on the situation on the Euro-Mediterranean borders

Report on the situation on the Euro-Mediterranean borders (from the point of view of the respect of Human Rights)

Euro-Mediterranean borders are internationally known, especially in Europe, for the causalities and the violation of Human Rights of migrant people trying to reach the European shores of Andalusia, Sicilia, Lampedusa, the Spanish cities of Ceuta and Melilla and later the shores of the Canary Islands. The management of migrations is a key topic of the contemporary national and European polices, mainly for the Euro-Mediterranean countries. These countries, characterized by their short history as destination of migration flows, now shape the southern border of the EU. Their geopolitical situation gives them an outstanding role regarding the control and containment of immigration from northern Africa. Despite the total amount of migrants arriving through these routes, it is very little among the totality of irregular migrants of Europe. Migration controls and border management are fields in which the deprivation of fundamental rights of migrant people is not isolated or accidental cases. The EU model of management of migratory flows has turned the casualties, the deprivation of freedom and other violations of Human Rights in something that happen again and again, mainly in the operations of surveillance and control of illegal migration that take place beyond the EU borders. In this framework, we found how the regression of the Rule of Law, one of the foundations of the European countries, allows the States reasserting in their policing functions instead of guaranteeing human rights. This paper approaches to the logics of European migration policies and its border management, looking to show the consequences from a rights-based approach of the implementation of these policies in the Mediterranean and Atlantic southern sea-border, paying special attention to the situation of human rights of people who has experienced the consequences of «control measures» of the border management carried out by the EU.

Summary:

I. Introduction. An approach to the concept of European borders.

II. Policies implemented in the Euro-Mediterranean and Atlantic borders. New actors and new stages.

III. The migration control policies at European southwestern borders: a critical overview from the international human rights law perspective.

IV. Conclusions.

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Report on the situation on the Euro-Mediterranean borders