14
Jun
2023
Watch
Preparation of the European Council meeting of 29-30 June 2023, in particular in the light of recent steps towards concluding the Migration Pact (debate)
Mr President, thank you very much. Madam Minister, colleagues! Last week, the Council agreed on a compromise on the migration pact, a compromise that was on a very, very delicate thread. The Council pleads, among other things, for swift expulsions of migrants coming from countries without a state of war, without threats to their lives, for migrants without grounds for asylum to be able to be deported to safe transit countries, and for migrant quotas dictated by Brussels to be something one would rather not see. As for my own country, Sweden, we have recently had a mass shooting that even left-liberal cultural writers associate with migration. Then the European Parliament cannot sit in the ivory tower and talk about the ‘narrative of fear’ – when teenagers in Sweden wonder: ‘Is it my turn next time? Are you going to lock me up at home now, Dad?’ It is very easy to do that, as neoliberals, you greens. If you adopt this attitude in the negotiations with the Council, I can promise you that: There will be no migration pact!