[From the diaries by susanhu.] According to the Italian newspaper L’Unita, France has decided to temporarily suspend its adherence to the Schengen agreement. The Schengen and Dublin agreements are legal accords adopted by several member states of the EU in 1985 and ratified by the majority of nations in 1991. They are concerned essentially with allowing for the free movement of citizens of the EU, as well as goods and services, from one nation to another without having to go through the hassle of passports, border check identifications and other bureaucratic obstacles. The goal was to achieve a greater degree of integration and unification in such maters as immigration policy and to eliminate different tariffs on good and services.
An article in l’Unità, however, informs us that:
While still searching for a common European strategy againt terrorism, the single member states are beginning to take action on their own account. The call to order of “security” (and the anti-communitarian reflex following on the “no” vote on the EU Constitution) has pushed a France to unilaterally suspend the Schengen treaty on the free circulation of citizens between EU nations.
The right wing leader and probable candidate for the premiership of France in the elections of 2007 Nicholas Sarkozy, who has been campaigning on a strongly anti-immigration platform, has been the strongest backer of the move to unilaterally withdraw and reestablish the old European barriers.
Holland also initially announce its intention of withdrawing from Schengen but eventually decided against it.
In Italy,the Northern League has applauded the move, but minister of the Interior [Guiseppe] Pisanu insists that Italy will not follow the Franco-Hollandese example.
We shall see how long the Berlusconi government can continue to resist this golden opportunity to exploit the popular hysteria about the invading Muslim hordes passing through the border with Slovenia.
These actions on the part of the French government follow immediately on the heels of a widespread crackdown on “alleged” terrorist front organizations and mosques in Italy. At least 200 to 300 immigrants of Muslim descent have had their homes sequestered and perquisitoned without warrant or judicial authorization based on allegations which, in some case, go back three to four years.
The Minister of Interior, Giuseppe Pisanu, has also recently proposed the implementation of laws modeled on the USA PATRIOT act of 2001.
I firmly believe that all of these developments should be carefully reflected upon, especially by those who call for a pause in the “politicization” of the discussion of the London bombings, within the context of this provocative observation made by the historian Juan Cole today on his blog:
One key al-Qaeda goal is to topple Western democracies and push them into fascism so as to punish Westerners for having supported authoritarian regimes in the Muslim world.
The important thing to note is that this strategy works, in part, by inducing the populations of Western nations into adopting submissive and supine attitudes of “national unity” based on fear of a common enemy (external and now even internal), exaggerated alarmism in the media and from the propaganda outlets of Western governments, and silencing of dissenting voices which will speak out loudly against the rising fascism.
Here comes the Patriot Act, European style. Berlusconi and his like (Bush), will always take advantage of fear for power gains. Some will even create the conditions for that fear (Bush). Hopefully Europeans will guard their freedoms more forcefully than the majority of Americans have.
When decisions are made out of pure emotion, people will agree with things they would otherwise find repugnant. Sounds like Europe is already firmly in the grip of panic.
Not to blow the thing out of proportion quite yet, but the extremely disturbing things that I’m seeing on televions news over here, wiht my own eyes, in the last fews days are what really provoked me to write this diary.
There are police and secirty people everywhere: loitering around in the subways with clubs in their hands, in the airports arbritrly checking into luggage and so on.
The tone of the media coverage, as well, seems to me to be completely disproportionate to the incident.
There’s fundamtally somehting different in the reaction of Eurpeons to this incident as opposed to 9/11 and the Madrid bombings.
Originally, I thouhg it was just Italy. But then I read the story about France and Holland and it’s quite easy to see what’s going on now.
What I do not understand, last Saturday I went to Torino. According to the TV News I saw in Italy, there were lots of securitiy exercises or razzias going on. But the strange thing was, on the border towards and also leaving Italy, we were just waved through, no checking passports, as has happened before, nothing at all. I would have expected that two days after London there would be severe border controls, at least on the border to a country that is not member of the EU.
Fran,
It’s well known, and I’ve discussed this with you many times, that Italy has extraordinarily restrive inmigration policies wiht regard to Africans from across the Mediterranean and wrt Eastern Europens coming through
Slovenia. I doubt they are very concerned with the possiblity of Muslim terrrist passing theorugh Switzerland!! The simple answer is why waste the time and resources on protecting the border with white-as-a-cracker Switzerland.
Yes, I agree with you, but at the same border I have experienced, on and off, quite sever controls over the last two years. So why not now. My guess is a smart terrorist would take a route like this, and not a heavy controlled or expected one. There are also Muslims living in Switzerland. Besides, any terrorist Muslim or not, just can fly to Zurich or Geneva and be in Italy within 2-3 hours drive. So I do not think this route can be totally excluded – or maybe I am just naive.
Because I told the immigraion ofiecers on that border that you would be passing though there, Fran!! How the devil would I know why that specific area was not as carefuly guarded as usual? I’m a philopher, for christ’s sake…
Thanks for telling them and clearing my way!
And also, I’d think, to justify their own claims about the intent and nature of the Western world. This lets them say that all that Freedom stuff really was just lies and deception.
Either way it serves their most fundamental interet of all: keeping alive the war on terror and clash of civiliztions mentality which is the fodder that sustains and presevers these social parasites in their symbiotic relationship with the host organism Western governments that need and dpepend on them just as much.
Woah… France and Holland aren’t withdrawing from the Schengen agreements. A better word is “activating a clause” in the Schengen Treaty which allows them to temporarily close their borders.
It isn’t even close to the first time European countries have done this, ok?
But as for Italy:
Pax
a bureactric distinction without a practical difference.
I did say that “temporarily” they are not paricipating in the Schengen agreements and let’s hope that’s the case.
It also may not be the first time (I never mantioned any such thing) but the timing IS intereting isn’t it?
Jerome a Paris writes about this too.
Sounds like France doesn’t trust the UK in it’s handling of the situation based on past experiences and now doesn’t want to get pulled into Blair’s new Bush imitation on fighting a War on Terra in all the wrong places.
Politics and war don’t mix very well.
It was an unfortunate incident but one that is repeated almost daily in Iraq.
Surely, Blair will use it to hold onto power considering his party was trying to oust him out even before the election. This is not conspiracy just the sad fact.
At the very least, the British did not almost elect Jean le Pen as prime mineter of their country. Maybe you think the Frecnh should have?
From what I remember, LePen lost badly. Yeah, he played big in a few regions — but on the whole he was soundly trounced.
That said, I can’t see this whole development as going anywhere but straight into misery. Anti-muslim sentiment was already rising in the late 90s, way before 9/11.
Anti-Muslim sentiment where? Let’s not mince words here. France? definitly!! Italy? Not nearly so much by any stretch of the imagination.
Your fundmatl point is right on and is, I’m sorry to say, what I belive is motivating the
closure of the borders on all sides, not some nonsense excue about the laxness of British immigration policy.
My experiences were in Germany, France, Belgium and Holland. Although in Germany, they ranted more about Turkish people (many of who happen to be Muslim) than about a general “Islamic threat.”
I didn’t have as much experience with Italy — and of the people I knew from, for example, Bulgaria and Romania — there was a bit of questioning and frustration, but they were more likely to rail against Russians, other Eastern Europeans and, specifically, Albanians (less because they’re Muslim, but because they were perceived as painfully “backwards”).
It makes me sad to see American legal intolerance spread to Europe. I mean, just because the general populace is a bit ignorant doesn’t mean you have to cement that shit into law!
Agree up to the point where you bring “American legal intolerance” in.
http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/0212/p07s01-woeu.htm
What sort of intolerance is it that is being exported to Europe? Doesn’t Europe have enough home-grown intolerance?
Of course it is not all America’s fault. What a ridiculous statement. But our legal precendents with the PATRIOT ACT is making dangerous and frustrating inroads into Europe.
As for closed borders — have you been to Canada lately? I got grilled (I’m as white as they come) at the border the last two times I went there.
One thing one must remember about Europe is that the EU is NOT akin to the U.S. Federal Government. There are surface similarities, sure. But my work permit in Germany, as an American, didn’t mean shit in France. I could collaborate with French research groups, but I’d have to file for a separate work permit in every member state if I wished to relocate there. It’s not quite the same in the U.S.
Maybe you think the Frecnh should have?
Why are you putting words and my mouth and what does this have to do with what I wrote?
France is “distancing” itself from the UK… for very good reasons. I pointed to Jerome post in which he said that the French still remember that the British have refused to extradite to France known terrorist who set off several bombs in France.
Now, Blair is going to act like Bush and start attacking everything in order to “look” macho.
How, in the name of Jove, does any of that explin why they are closing off their borders toward Spain, Italy, Belgium and so on?
This is simply the manipulation of the same anti-immigration and Islamophobic hysteria which led to the defeat of the referndum on the EU constitution. This squabbe with the British is just a conventionet little rationalization.
Well, France isn’t closing the borders where I live. People have been able to cross normally today. Lots of French people crossing into Switzerland for work. Also the borders here between France and Germany are working normally. I know that from people who had to pass through the border. Further nothing in the news – that would be a major headline, as a lot of people from this area go either to France or Germany for shopping. So I am not sure if this is not overblown news.
Why was it done in the first place? Given what you assert and given that the UK is not party the the Schengen agreements in any case, why do YOU thnk that this decidion was made, bearing in mind that politicsns do not make decisions wihtout the motvation of obtainting osme practcial obhjteive?
I would say it was a symboic gesture designed to exploit the irrational institincs in the French people. They are human beings and sucscpetible to the same nationistic and isolationist isitnts as all other human beings. Policlans are inherentyl manipulative. hy should the French be any ecpetion to the general rule with regard to human nature.
It takes an unbeleivable amount of arrogance to belive otherwise.
And if it was a purely symbolic gesture in this sense, it makes it even worse than I thought.
As to the importance if news, I think that Gannon/Gueckert in the most overblown story that I’ve ever come across in my life. But obvuiously many people disagree with me. That’s fine with me. But I donìt go comenting in people’s diaries, minimizing or ridiculing the value of a sroty which many think is the biggest scandal since Emperor Nero was accused of deliberately setting fire to Rome (probably not true by the way)..
Closing the boders is not only not the solution but it will ultimately turn out to be counterproductive, I am profoundly convinced.
Are you familiar with the quotas in immigration that the US imposed from circa 1920 to circa 1960? Isn’t it facsunting that it was preciely during that period that Italian organzined crime thrived and prospred with the most extroadinty vigor.
You can’t keep human bengs out of you so-called “land” foerever. They will always be able to find there way in, if not legally then illegally. You have to actively work to integreate them…
For heavens sakes the borders in Europe where closed for decades and just opened up recently.
This is not like Texas and Mexico with people scurring across desserts and vigilantes chasing down poor people.
There are exisiting border points that will be “re” opened.
Is it just an odd coincidence that the only politicians in Italy to applaud this move are members of the neo-fascist, profoundly racist and anti-immigration Northern League? Do you know anything about the Northern League?
Even Bersloni’s Minister of the Interior said this was destructive of any potenial for finding a common solution of the problems underlying intrenational terrorism. The Berslsoni goverenemtn, which practices forced repatriatian of north African immigrants and politcally persecuted refugees, thinks this policy is too harsh, for god’s sake!!
I live here in Europe, and I’m not really getting a sense of panic at all. There’s the current situation, post-London, which needs to be dealt with…that’s reality. Then there’s longer term political change which will involve a lot more discussion, which I also believe will develop slower. You still have a pretty strong moderate to moderate-left population here, overall, who tend to honor civil rights.
a more appropriate title would be “European governements and media exploiting tragedy in London to foster anti-Muslim panic”, but that’s really too long and not very attention-grabbing, is it?
Not to lecture to Europeans, given the deep problems with my own government, but this is exactly the wrong thing to do. Europe and all of its parts, particularly those of the Schengen nations, must come to terms with both their internal Muslim populations and the many newcomers. Given slow population growth in Europe generally, to succeed economically they need to embrace immigration.
Immigration is not the cause of terrorism, or unemployment, or the rise in welfare spending in European countries. In fact, healthy immigration improves the economy. As for terrorism, it’s in part a fundamentalist response to the modern world, and partly a response to real grievances with occupational foreign policies. The way to respond to terrorism is to address those grievances, and tackle the fears of fundamentalism head-on through a vigorous defense of multicultural society. Open borders within Europe and relatively open borders to the rest of the world help to foster a healthy multiculturalism that undermines the root causes of terrorism.
That’s not to say there aren’t problems of cultural accomodation as immigrant communities try to integrate into the larger culture without fully losing their own identity. It’s not an easy process for either immmigrants or existing residents and citizens, but it’s far preferable to one that tries to forestall change and turns people inward, which in the end only makes the problem worse. Even if this withdrawal from Schengen in practice is merely temporary, it’s a pointless step backward and exactly the wrong thing to do.
For similar reasons, I also favor much more liberal immigration policies in the US. This would force the US and Mexico to tackle the economic disparities between them, so as to avoid the exodus of people northward and create more capital development within Mexico.l As for Muslim immigrants, I say bring more in so that the broader American culture can come to terms with the humanity of those who follow Islam, and realize that terrorism is not about culture or religion but about a small minority of fanatics. And an open policy towards Muslim immigrants to the US would also reinforce positive attitudes about our country in the broader Muslim world, reducing some of the impetus for terrorism. It works the same way here as in Europe, though admittedly because of geography the difficulties are more immediate in places like France and Italy. But the principle and proper policy is the same.