"Will shatter European unity": what scale can the migration crisis in the EU reach due to the events in Afghanistan

The European Asylum Office (EASO) records an upward trend in migration to the EU.

EASO executive director Nina Gregory announced this.

According to her, the number of asylum applications has almost reached the dock level.

“In August 2021, the EU states registered 56 thousand applications for international protection.

It was the third month in a row that there has been a clear increase in the number of asylum requests in the EU, ”Gregory said in an interview with the Funke media group.

She clarified that this year the bureau notes an increase in the number of asylum seekers in Eastern Europe, primarily on the Balkan route.

These states include Bulgaria, Slovenia, Croatia.

We are also talking about Austria.

Gregory called Latvia and Lithuania “migration hotspots”.

At the same time, according to German media, Germany continues to rank first among the EU countries in terms of the number of asylum applications filed.

In September alone, more than 13,000 applications were registered in Germany, most of which came from people from Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq.

According to Gregory, in general, the number of asylum applications from Afghans has significantly increased in the EU.

“In August 2021, 10 thousand people applied for international protection.

Compared to July, the increase was 38%.

But it is also related to the fact that Afghans who have long lived in Europe, or newly arrived Afghans who were evacuated from Kabul via an air bridge, resubmitted their asylum requests.

So far, we do not see Afghans from Afghanistan moving towards Europe, ”she said.

At the same time, Gregory predicted that the situation in Afghanistan "will have an impact" on the European asylum system.

“We must prepare for the difficult situation with the influx of migrants from Afghanistan to Europe,” she said.

“We are building up opportunities for receiving refugees in the Balkans, we are preparing important recommendations for the EU countries regarding Afghanistan so that the asylum process is efficient, and we are preparing a program for the resettlement of Afghans in the EU.”

• Kabul street

• Reuters

• © Zohra Bensemra

As soon as European states decide to resettle refugees from Afghanistan to Europe, EASO will be ready to “play a key role in this process,” added Gregory.

Earlier, the EU reported that the political union had already received 22 thousand Afghans after the radical Taliban * came to power.

At the same time, Brussels noted that there is still a "long list" of those who need to be protected.

Military-political context

It is worth noting that the risk of a new migration crisis increased after the United States swiftly withdrew its troops from Afghanistan.

A similar decision was soon announced by other countries of the Western coalition.

Against this background, the confrontation between the Taliban and government forces has intensified.

As a result, the Taliban gained control over almost the entire territory of the Islamic republic.

Due to the military and political upheavals, many Afghans rushed to neighboring countries, as well as to the United States and European states.

However, neither the United States nor the European Union is in a rush to accept Afghan refugees.

Thus, the EU proposed to organize an international forum dedicated to the issue of the placement of internally displaced persons from Afghanistan.

According to Brussels, the solution to the migration crisis "must be international", since the consequences of the situation in the Islamic republic are global.

• Withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan

• Reuters

• © US Army / Master Sgt.

  Alex burnett

At the same time, Moscow believes that the fate of the refugees "should be responsible for those who collaborated with these specific people."

“Now many are persuading Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Kazakhstan: take refugees for a couple of months, and then we will take them for ourselves, we need to issue documents for them.

If they have been cooperating for many years with Western countries - with the Americans and others - does it really take two months to draw up the documents?

This is not a very correct thing, "Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on October 8.

After that, he also stressed that the issue of NATO's responsibility for the consequences of its "twenty-year experiments" in Afghanistan is bypassed by the alliance.

“The international community, especially the neighbors of Afghanistan, is invited to deal with the problems,” Lavrov said.

"The Situation Remains Unstable"

According to experts, the growth of refugees recorded in the EU is only the beginning of a new migration wave, provoked primarily by the actions of the United States in Afghanistan.

“The situation in the Islamic republic remains unstable.

At the same time, the United States is pushing Europeans to accept refugees from Afghanistan, without wanting to participate in it themselves.

But the EU does not want to take on such a burden, because it is still working out the consequences of the migration crisis of 2015, "Vladimir Olenchenko, senior researcher at the Center for European Studies at the IMEMO RAS, said in an interview with RT.

A similar position was expressed by Nikita Danyuk, Deputy Director of the Institute for Strategic Studies and Forecasts of the RUDN University, a member of the Public Chamber of Russia.

According to him, the wave of migration in Europe was mainly provoked by the hasty withdrawal of the Americans from Afghanistan.

“And they did it purposefully, knowing full well that the EU would be under attack.

Considering that Europe, in fact, could not withstand the migration crisis in 2015, even the quota system did not help to find a common European consensus, the current migration wave, which can number about three million refugees, is likely to shatter European unity, "the expert suggested in comments RT.

How severe the consequences of this migration wave will be for the European Union depends on the level of stability in Afghanistan under the Taliban, Danyuk said.

“Do not forget that Afghan refugees are not only a problem of how to receive and adapt them.

The main difficulty lies in the fact that among the internally displaced persons there may be members of terrorist groups, including IS **, ”he explained.

Olenchenko, in turn, stated that the EU has not yet developed a clear position on how to deal with Afghan refugees.

“But Europe still has to solve this, since those several million Afghans who are now outside their country, but not in the EU, will sooner or later think about moving to Europe, which seems to them the most attractive to stay,” the analyst explained.

• Refugees from Afghanistan descend the plane at the Torrejon de Ardoz airbase in the suburbs of Madrid

• RIA News

• © Gustavo Valiente

At the same time, Olenchenko predicted that, as in 2015, Germany and France could fall under the blow of the new migration crisis.

“In addition, probably, like last time, there will be dissident countries who refuse to accept refugees - these are Poland, the Baltic countries, Hungary and the Czech Republic,” the analyst summed up.

* "Taliban" - the organization was recognized as terrorist by the decision of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation of February 14, 2003.

** "Islamic State" (IS, ISIS) - the organization was recognized as terrorist by the decision of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation of December 29, 2014.