“Now I would like an explanation why only 3 countries are being singled out with sanctions, when most EU countries are not following this law. To show the scale of this: only about 17% of migrants have been resettled in this 2 year programme that ends this month.”

The overabundance of articles about Hungary, Poland and Slovakia being targeted with sanctions may explain that some people will see them as “singled out”. A quick search proves this:

Does it mean they will be the only ones facing sanctions? Of course not. The Commission itself put out comments for almost every EU member State. The only difference being with Hungary, Poland and Austria that “ have not relocated a single person ”.

There are no biases or vendettas against a State that doesn’t apply EU law and failed to challenge its legality. Again, it comes down to the point that I tried to make in the previous article that sanctions are made for respecting the law and if we start to attribute them to grudge or retribution, then sanctions and by extent the law become useless.

i could go in detail for the sake of equality stating that Belgium and Spain have to increase their pledges, that Estonia and Ireland should find a solution in regards to problems coming from security interviews and that France should accept more relocations from Italy. It doesn’t change the implicit notion that sanctions will be made if the law isn’t respected.

The focus coming from various news outlets to Hungary and Poland has to do with their position in the Council being the most vocal and their resistence being the most fierce to the measure. Understandably it will get some attention and consequently some comments (unwarranted or relevant).

My point personnaly was that even if you don’t agree with the sanctions, you have the implement it except if it would be a grand violation of one’s rights. In this case, there is no such violation. The case was about procedural requirements which can be used in court to circumvent the real legal discussion and the legal question beneath all this.

If the Case was about the security concerns stemming from the relocation of possible terrorists in another Member State, that would have served a better interest and would have been a perfect opportunity to address the popular unease about the measure.

However, we just got fodder for people to feel targeted and the EU to be targeted. At least the heads of State from all sides of the argument got to score neat political points with their electorate despite failing to provide what Europeans want:

A solution.

The point I would have liked to stress more in the article is that this is all coming from the European governments. The “EU” solution was merely a solution adopted between the heads of States elected by each country as their president/ prime minister. The Commission did push for this solution as well as others to the Council for an urgent vote. The legislation, the idea of relocation comes from the Commission but the vote, amendments and implementation was all the State’s responsability.

You can blame the EU as the Council of heads of States for not solving the problem, you can’t blame the EU as something that controls everything like a dictatorial government. It simply doesn’t have such power.

The Commission can open cases against countries that violate EU law, such countries can still refer their case to the ECJ for an impartial judgement.

The Commission still needs that the law is passed following the legal procedure. Meaning that everything is up to a vote or debate of some kind. Normally a government adopts measures in times of crisis without needing to refer to Parliament. In the EU, the Commission cannot do that as it needs to agreement of the Council of member States.

Governments by their nature don’t apprehend debates. They are used to pass executive debates without any shackles whereas here they have to seat at a table to arrive at a solution. One may call for the failure of the Union right here but we simply cannot afford for each country to defend for themselves. The whole point of the relocation quota was to help fellow member States to deal with a problem that was outside their capabilities. The Court understood this and called for this cooperation in the press release.

Where does it leave us now? Germany’s chancellor is calling for no sanctions as a sign of good faith between all countries. I personnaly call this unacceptable for everyone involved as it reinforces the idea that European law is maleable to the governments’ liking. In doing so, Europeans will not see anything special in the EU except some fancy name given to just another G7 type of conference. We cannot tolerate that as the Union represents much more than the European heads of State, the same way a country is so much more than its president.

Europeans are united because they share the same basic values of democracy, rule of law and political debate. The European nation has to be able to discuss outside of their governmental representation. One must have the right to make his voice heard on these questions and that is why the European Parliament exists. The calls for a European solution to the refugee crisis has been met with political stubborness of the executives. We need to circumvent it by implementing a EU wide border patrol and harmonised asylum law, controlled directly by the Commission with oversight by the governments and the European Parliament. This way everyone is represented whilst the EU response can be effective.

Statewatch.org, an independent website “monitoring the state and civil liberties in Europe” has released a leak containing the position of the Council about what to do next:

Speeding up the training of the Libyan Coast Guard

Reinforcing support to border controls in Southern Libya, Niger and Chad to prevent the movement of irregular migrants towards Libya

Assisted Voluntary Returns from Libya and Niger to countries of origin

conclude effective arrangements with third countries to expedite return operations

new capacities of the European Border and Coast Guard in the field of return must be urgently mobilised to its full potential

work towards aligning the concept of “safe third country”

While this sounds reassuring, it also stressed that “Member States are

invited to demonstrate political will and to take determined action to deliver on the relevant Council decisions” (in reference to the one about relocation quotas). This highlights the problem I tried to expose and it doesn’t signal any development in regards to actually enforcing the solutions.

With a pessimist view, sanctions will probably be made, governments will try to turn this to their electorate as a threat to them and the political gridlock will continue.

With a positive outlook, I can only hope that the arrival of EU-wide Parliament members will make some people realise that Europe is bigger than 28 seats.