Keyword: migrants

Speaking at a joint press conference in Rome on Wednesday, Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte and French President Emmanuel Macron called for all 28 member states of the EU to share reception of the numbers of migrants landing in Europe after being rescued from perilous crossings of the Mediterranean Sea, when Macron said those who refused to do so should be 'seriously penalized'.

Authorities were alerted to the migrants' plight off Dunkirk by a ferry just after midnight and sent out search and rescue teams.

Around 150 migrants from Latin America – Colombia, Cuba, Peru, Bolivia and the Dominican Republic – are living in a makeshift street camp in a Paris suburb having recently been evicted from a disused warehouse in which they were squatting. Some came to France for a better life for their family, others for political reasons. But as Irene Casado reports, all the migrants, who include children and pregnant women, face an uncertain future faced with the indifference of the local mayor and the lack of suitable housing.

Stalingrad Connection, named after a Paris metro station where homeless migrants once set up a makeshift camp for shelter, broadcasts in five languages to keep asylum seekers in contact with each other, to report on their experiences and to provide practical information.

Faycal, from Sudan, is now applying for asylum in Tunisia. © Lilia Blaise

The authorities in Tunisia have been overwhelmed following the shipwreck off neighbouring Libya on July 1st 2019 which left 90 migrants drowned. Graveyards are full, migrant reception centres cannot cope and there is no overall integration plan to welcome migrants into society. The Tunisian government is also critical of the inaction of European countries over the issue. Lilia Blaise reports from Medenine in south-west Tunisia.

A group of hundreds of mostly West Afican migrants stormed the Panthéon mausoleum in the Paris Latin Quarter on Friday to demand that the government review their status as illegal residents unable to obtain recognised rights to work and live in France.

The 39-year-old Iranian national, accused of arranging several crossings from northern France to England, fainted upon hearing his sentence.

The UN’s special rapporteur for housing, Leilani Farha, has spoken out at the 'inhuman or degrading treatment' of migrants and refugees living without proper shelter in France, notably in and around Calais where, she said, 'people are being compelled to live in really dire circumstances, having already endured harrowing journeys there'.

Authorities in the French city of Bayonne are struggling to cope with the number of migrants coming from across the nearby Spanish border. Mediapart met Joseph and Moriba, 'blood  brothers' who are seeking France's protection after nearly dying at sea crossing to Europe from Morocco. After a legal battle, Joseph has now been recognised as a minor by the French courts while Moriba's request will be heard on appeal shortly. Mathilde Mathieu reports.

The 30-mile stretch of coast being used by migrants is too large to patrol and resources are limited, says mayor of Teteghem in northern France.

The French authorities have set out plans to improve cooperation with UK and increase their coastal surveillance.

British and French sea rescue services intervened in the early hours on Christmas Day to bring to safety at least 40 migrants, including children, attempting to cross the English Channel to England in precarious conditions in five separate boats.  

Italy's far-right interior minister Matteo Salvini said he has demanded an explanation from Paris over an alleged incursion into his country by a French police van which Italian media said was captured on CCTV releasing two men thought to be African migrants in woods near Turin.

Migrants blocked at the railway station at Vintimille on the French-Italian border, June 15th, 2015. © LF

The migrant issue has become a decisive test for all those on the Left who campaign for the emancipation of the people and equal rights for all. Mediapart publishing editor Edwy Plenel argues that far from protecting existing rights, any concession to the politics of rejection, to the favouring of one nationality over others or to policies based on borders and identity, will simply help the cause of the extreme right.