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I am glad to be in Malta for the Summit today, because you (Malta) are a symbol of a bridge between the EU and Africa. Being an island, you understand very well that you cannot build walls in the sea. So having the summit here (in Malta) gives the real sense of the cooperation we are looking for with our African partners and that we are already building.
Migration, and management of the refugee flows, is a challenge both for the European Union and Africa. With all the African friends that I have been meeting in these months, in this first year in office, I have shared their worries, their hard work on the refugees and the migrants they are themselves hosting in their countries as well as (…) the fact that we all need to save lives; at sea, or at land, in the desert or at our borders. We must welcome and protect those that are in need of international protection and asylum and also provide legal, regular ways for legal migration. But we also need to have some plans to reintegrate returnees once they are returning to their own countries, if they are not regular migrants to Europe.
All of this is something that we have on our agenda, on our table together. These are issues for the African leaders; for the African countries; for the African organisations; for the African Union; these are also issues for the European countries. The only way of managing this phenomenon is by doing this together, building cooperation and building common instruments.
We have been struggling with this inside the European Union for the last months. I believe that we are today in a position that was unimaginable even 7-8 months ago, when migration seemed to be an issue only for some Member States, now it is really a European issue.
Now we are in a second stage somehow, building this partnership with our African partners and deciding common instruments to manage this.
The Trust Fund we are going to launch here is one of those, but it is not only about money. I want to make it very clear. This is about building opportunities for people, protecting people’s lives, fighting against criminal networks that exploit people’s desperation and doing this together. I think together is the key word of this summit.
We will have a Common Statement; we will also have a Common Action Plan with concrete steps to be implemented over the next year, monitored and done together. I have spent the last 6-7 months travelling across Africa, meeting with our African partners, hosting them in Brussels, with the G5 Sahel, with Niger, with the Horn of Africa, with all the Northern African partners, to sit together and find together ways to manage better on our side, on their side; to save lives, offering opportunities, managing the flows in a sustainable way.
Questions
L’Africa vuole parlare d’immigrazione legale, l’Europa può dire qualcosa, ha qualcosa da proporre?
Certamente! Noi abbiamo iniziato un lavoro non soltanto sulla protezione dei rifugiati, non soltanto sulla protezione e il salvataggio di vite in mare, non soltanto sulla creazione di opportunità economiche in Africa, ma anche su canali legali d’immigrazione.
Il movimento di persone da quando è iniziata la storia dell’uomo è una grande opportunità. Gli europei ne hanno beneficiato per decenni se non per secoli ed è un fenomeno che sicuramente non sparirà se non altro per motivi demografici, per motivi economici, per motivi anche legati al cambiamento climatico.
E’ chiaro che in questo servono anche canali d’immigrazione legale. L’Unione Europea sta lavorando a delle proposte in questo senso che arriveranno nei prossimi mesi. Oggi qui si tratta di concordare un’agenda condivisa su tutti questi settori, dalla lotta ai trafficanti, al salvataggio di vite nel deserto del Sahara e in mare, nel Mediterraneo. Noi stiamo salvando migliaia di vite umane con le nostre operazioni dell’Unione Europea. Cerchiamo partnership, cerchiamo cooperazione, cerchiamo una condivisione di responsabilità con i nostri partner africani e io in questi mesi di incontri con loro ho trovato una grande attenzione, una grande responsabilità, una grande voglia di lavorare insieme, al di là di ogni polemica, in modo molto concreto, in modo molto operativo perché è una questione, non voglio dire un problema, è una questione che riguarda noi e che riguarda loro nello stesso modo. L’unico modo di gestirla è farlo insieme.
How dependent are we from the Africans to tackle this crisis?
We are interdependent. We depend on them, they depend on us. We are in this together. This is the sense — I think — of this summit.
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