Much of Europe is buckling under the weight of illegal immigration. Now, Bulgaria’s Interior Minister is among those saying that hostile state action is behind the migration:
Russian spies and hard-left humanitarian groups are working with people smugglers to flood Europe with illegal migrants, a Bulgarian minister says.
Daniel Mitov, the interior minister, said his government had evidence that Russia’s foreign intelligence service had direct links with the criminal gangs facilitating illegal immigration into the European Union.
He said Russian spies were helping people smugglers find weaknesses in the EU’s external borders, including Bulgaria’s border with Turkey, and were telling migrants how to exploit EU and UK asylum systems and avoid removal.
Britain’s Foreign Secretary agrees:
Yvette Cooper, the foreign secretary, said Mitov’s revelations exposed the threats posed by hostile states like Russia. She said: “It is clear that illegal migration into Europe and beyond is being driven not just by organised crime networks seeking to make a profit, but by hostile state actors seeking to destabilise Europe.
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“We will therefore continue to support Bulgaria and our other Nato allies in securing Europe’s external frontiers, and tackling every different type of threat we face from the Putin regime, including providing the specialist equipment, intelligence and training that will help our Bulgarian counterparts to defend their borders and disrupt these criminal operations.”
Left-wing NGOs are also part of the problem:
Mitov said Bulgaria had become concerned about the activities of some NGOs. He said: “They are neo-Marxist groups which are trying to justify their actions through philosophical or ideological constructs. Basically, let’s get all the poor people from the world and let them establish themselves here, the absolute freedom of movement, the non-existence of borders and so on and so forth.
“So unfortunately, we do have challenges with such non-governmental organisations which, maybe unwittingly…
It isn’t unwitting.
…take part in the operations of those hostile states and the criminal networks which smuggle people illegally into the territory of the EU and the UK.”
There will be a summit meeting in London tomorrow, at which representatives of various nations will “discuss closer co-operation on tackling illegal immigration through the western Balkans, one of the main routes into the EU.”
I am glad to see European leaders acknowledge that illegal immigration is destabilizing the continent. And it is not at all surprising that Russia is working to enable such immigration, or that left-wing NGOs are actively undermining Western democracies.
But this is what I don’t understand: the remedy for illegal immigration is simple. Kick them out! In Europe, as in America, there is a strange lassitude that takes hold when an illegal once sets foot on a nation’s soil. It is like a children’s game where there is a home base. Having reached that base, the player is safe. But that is a self-inflicted path to national suicide. It is all very well to blame the Russians, who must, for their part, be puzzled by the ineffectiveness of Western governments on this issue. But every nation has the solution to the problem in its grasp, if it only chooses to use it.
