http://www.breitbart.com/london/2015/02/12/how-well-meaning-leftists-are-luring-thousands-to-their-deaths/
HOW WELL MEANING LEFTISTS ARE LURING THOUSANDS TO THEIR DEATHS
by SIMON KENT
12 Feb 2015
Another day, another disaster, yet they still come. By “they” I mean
the tens of thousands of illegal immigrants sailing across the
Mediterranean for Europe.
Not all of them make it. Too many drown in the attempt. It doesn’t
have to be this way.
The latest tragedy occurred Wednesday when the UN High Commission for
Refugees (UNHCR) revealed that upwards of 300 souls perished in frigid
temperatures after their inflatable rafts sank beneath them as they
tried to cross from North Africa.The information came to light after
nine survivors were landed on the Italian island of Lampedusa. They
were among those who had left the Libyan capital Tripoli on Saturday
in four rubber dinghies.
Carlotta Sami, a spokeswoman for the UNHCR, said the victims had been
“swallowed up by the waves,” with the youngest a child of 12.
“This is a tragedy on an enormous scale and a stark reminder that more
lives could be lost if those seeking safety are left at the mercy of
the sea,” Mr Cochetel said in a statement.
The story doesn’t end there. It’s only the beginning. The UNHCR says
almost 3,500 people died attempting to cross the Mediterranean Sea to
reach Europe in 2014, making it the world’s most dangerous sea
crossing for migrants. More than 200,000 people were rescued during
the same period.
Here are the UNHCR’s own estimates of the human tide coming ashore in Europe.
More than 75,000 refugees and migrants arrived in Italy, Greece, Spain
and Malta by sea in the first half of 2014 – 25 per cent more than the
60,000 who made the same journey in the whole of 2013, and over three
times the 22,500 who arrived in all of 2012.
Italy received the greatest number of arrivals (63,884), followed by
Greece (10,080), Spain (1,000) and Malta (227). A further 21,000
refugees and migrants have arrived in Italy since 1 July. The largest
numbers came from Eritrea, Syria and Mali. Most left from North
Africa, and principally Libya, with their method of travel becoming
more sophisticated, more organised and using larger craft.
Like this. Last December the Italian coastguard said they narrowly
averted a “massacre” after a cargo ship was abandoned off the southern
coast of Italy with more than 900 Syrian refugees on board.
Officers said their vessel’s engines had been locked and its steering
set on a course which would have seen it run aground somewhere along
Italy’s Puglia coastal region.
And this. Another cargo ship was found 48-hours later abandoned by its
crew off Italy with over 300 migrants on board, mostly from Syria. The
Italian navy took control of the ageing Sierra Leone-flagged ship, the
Ezadeen, and steered it to the port of Corigliano Calabro.
How do we stop such madness? We just say no.
If illegal immigrants knew that simply arriving on European soil would
be no guarantee of staying, would they still risk it? If people
smugglers also knew that, would they be able to extort huge amounts of
money from the desperately vulnerable in the vain attempt to try?
Australia provides an example of how Europe’s expensive, public
display of overt compassion is killing the very people it is trying to
help.
Under the current coalition government of Prime Minister Tony Abbott,
the flow of refugees seeking to enter Australia by boat has stopped.
Abbott’s government tows any vessel found straight back to where it
started from. In most cases that is Indonesia. The policy of immediate
return has been well publicised and those who do make it into
Australian territorial waters are sent to offshore islands in New
Guinea or Nauru for processing.
Australia then uses its famous ‘points based system’ to decide who is
a genuine refugee and who is an economic migrant. End of story. The
Abbott government went to the September 2013 polls promising to ‘stop
the boats’ on the basis that the journey the asylum seekers make is
dangerous and controlled by criminal gangs and they have a duty to
stop it.
The message was simple but effective. No means no.
By July 2014 there had been zero new arrivals nor deaths at sea for
200 days. Two months later a total of 12 boats containing 383 people
had been turned around, in some cases towed by Australian naval
vessels, with more disrupted before they set off from places as far
away as Sri Lanka.
Abbott knew the scale of the growing problem before he took office.
UNHCR’s Asylum Trends 2013 report said Australia received 24,300
claims for asylum in 2013, making it the eighth largest recipient of
asylum seekers in the industrialised world. That figure is about 4% of
all applications made globally in 2013. Australian government
statistics show that between 2012 and 2013 more than 18,000 people
arrived in Australia illegally by sea, compared to 7,300 between 2011
and 2012. By the end of 2014 that number was close to zero.
So a policy of saying no to illegal immigration turned a deluge into a
trickle to none at all.
By contrast Europe’s porous borders and unquestioning acceptance of
every single person who steps onto its shores claiming asylum is an
unmitigated disaster and an example of the law of unintended
consequences. By trying to be compassionate, Europe is luring
thousands to their death. At the same time it is making human
traffickers rich beyond measure.
The problem knows no boundaries. Regard the huge camps outside the
French city of Calais, full of migrants from north and sub-Saharan
Africa who want to travel to the UK any way they can. Their reasoning
is simple. The mayor of Calais has said as much herself.
Last October Natacha Bouchart spoke before a House of Commons select
committee and warned that Britain is an ‘El Dorado’ for thousands of
migrants flocking to Calais en-route to a land of generous handouts.
Blaming the UK for the crisis in the port city, Bouchart said lavish
benefits and the prospect of illegal work and accommodation were
magnets for immigrants determined to get across the English Channel.
“The weekly benefits of £36 that are given to migrants or asylum
seekers is a huge amount for people who have nothing in their lives,”
Bouchart said.
“They have no idea about the value of money … But they know from those
people who have got through [to Britain] that … they can easily find
work, don’t have to declare their work, they can find accommodation
and can get some money every week. People who have got through call
and say, ‘ … this is El Dorado and we’re staying here’.”
Unlimited access to benefits is not just a draw on the other side of
the Mediterranean. Closer to home Serbia is trying to halt a massive
human exodus from crossing its border into Hungary, a flow that has
triggered alarm in many EU countries. As long as the UK remains within
the EU it has to accept the same flow of illegal migrants and economic
refugees from elsewhere because the guarantee of unrestricted travel
within EU signatory nations is a given.
It doesn’t matter where a migrant starts his or her journey, they know
they can eventually make it to the UK as long as they try hard enough.
The door is open and they simply walk in, a process that started as
far back as 2001 when Labour decided to open up the UK to mass
immigration – legal and now increasingly illegal.
This can be stopped by just saying no. Or leaving the EU. Or both. If
those on the compassionate, progressive left are truly concerned about
the fate of illegal immigrants being lured to their deaths, they would
agree.
But I’m not holding my breath. Are you?
Received on Sun Feb 15 2015 - 10:27:32 EST