Topic: Europe encourages its neighbours to practise migration blackmail
Meta started this discussion 1 hour ago #136,795
https://www.economist.com/europe/2026/08/05/europe-encourages-its-neighbours-to-practise-migration-blackmailIT WAS like a tide surging onto the beach and then ebbing, leaving wreckage behind. The vast majority of the tens of thousands of would-be migrants who began rushing into Ceuta, a small Spanish exclave on the north African coast, on July 30th returned to Morocco within 24 hours, having found nothing to eat and no prospect of reaching Europe. Discarded shoes and shirts still litter the bay. A few thousand migrants remain, mainly sub-Saharan Africans and minors, as does a heavy police presence. Yet though the immediate crisis is over, the clash it triggered in the European Union will leave scars.
Crisis? What crisis? These are the New Europeans, ready to work and pay taxes!The surge almost doubled Ceuta’s population of 84,000, briefly overwhelming the town.
You mean almost doubled Ceuta's GDP and left the local government coffers overwhelmed with tax funds for social welfare. The extraordinary images prompted panic across Europe. Italy, backed by Denmark and Finland, said it would suspend co-operation with Spain in the passport-free Schengen zone (in the end it imposed minor spot checks at ports and airports). Sweden’s prime minister, facing a tricky re-election bid next month, said “2015 must not happen again,” a reference to a huge migration surge into Europe that still haunts governments.
Why is this bad? Since mass immigration boosts GDP shouldn't Swedes be hoping they can have another 2015 every year? 🤔Europe has long experience of such migration blackmail. In 2008 Muammar Qaddafi, then Libya’s dictator, secured billions from Italy to keep African migrants away; two years later he warned an audience in Rome that “tomorrow Europe might no longer be European and might even be black”.
Great replacement theory! Yikes! 😬 Thank god Hillary and Obama took that racist meanie out and turned Libya into anarchy and open air slave markets. You can buy a slave now for as little as $400: https://www.humanrightsresearch.org/post/the-scandal-of-a-slave-market-in-libya which is much less (inflation adjusted) than old time Southern plantation owners had to pay! Now THAT's progress! 💵👦🏿👦🏿Most shamelessly, since 2021 Belarus has flown in Middle Eastern migrants and sent them into Poland and neighbouring states. Regarding this as an act of hybrid war, in 2021 the EU strengthened its sanctions on Belarus, an ally of Vladimir Putin.
Wait what? Why are they mad at Belarus?! Belarus is just trying to help Europe fund its social welfare with more young workers who are exactly as productive and law-abiding as old stock Europeans. If anything, they should be thankful the Belarusian people are so idiotic that they don't want to grow their own economy! In 2015 politicians in Germany or Sweden who saw hundreds of thousands of Syrian and other migrants reach Greece understood this would soon be their problem.
I thought Merkel and Friends were happy about it? What happened to Refugees Welcome and Wir schaffen das (We can do this)?(Edited 1 minute later.)
Mate joined in and replied with this 37 minutes ago, 34 minutes later[^] [v] #1,451,370
Mate double-posted this 7 minutes ago, 30 minutes later, 1 hour after the original post[^] [v] #1,451,377
Mr. Bloody Lemonade !0JqexkOGBc joined in and replied with this 6 minutes ago, 47 seconds later, 1 hour after the original post[^] [v] #1,451,378
Man, these Europeans sure sound like incompetent rulers.
Mr. Bloody Lemonade !0JqexkOGBc double-posted this 5 minutes ago, 39 seconds later, 1 hour after the original post[^] [v] #1,451,379
Maybe we should let people who aren’t incompetent run things instead.
Anonymous D joined in and replied with this 4 minutes ago, 1 minute later, 1 hour after the original post[^] [v] #1,451,380
