EU passes new immigration laws putting local political considerations first

The European Parliament has passed a landmark package of laws to overhaul its rules on borders and migration. The Pact on Migration and Asylum comes after nearly a decade of deadlock on migration policy, kicked off by the tumultuous migration crisis of 2015.

That year, roughly a million people made hazardous journeys across the Mediterranean and the Aegean seas to reach the presumed safety of Europe. That volume of migrants, mainly refugees and asylum seekers from Africa and the Middle East, overwhelmed several EU member states. Italy and Greece in particular found themselves hosting many thousands of people in temporary camps, with insufficient support for people often suffering from their journeys.

At the time, the EU’s policies to limit those seeking asylum from moving from one state to the next, making a series of asylum applications, proved inadequate. These arrangements were put in place in the late 1990s, after the end of the cold war led to a significant volume of migration into and around Europe. In contrast, 2015 impacted many countries that previously had not experienced any significant immigration.

States like Hungary that didn’t have these migrants arriving on their shores either felt a lack of responsibility or even claimed there was a threat to European civilisation. This resulted in (not so) temporary...

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