Europe has the opportunity to have a resilient, united, ambitious migration policy, Schinas says

"Europe has the opportunity to have a resilient, united, ambitious migration policy," European Commissioner for the Promotion of Our European Way of Life, Margaritis Schinas, said on Thursday, presenting the new Pact on Migration and Asylum to the Committee on Civil Liberties of the European Parliament in Brussels.

"We have not discovered the wheel, we have not rebuilt the Parthenon, the perfect edifice, with this Pact. The series of proposals that we presented yesterday is a set of parameters to find solutions," Schinas said, adding that the proposal of the European Commission is the result of intensive and extensive consultation.

After explaining that all member-states do not experience the phenomenon of migration in the same way and that the European Commission, through the new Pact, is trying to present a truly holistic and coherent approach, he stressed that this is a multifaceted issue and nobody is entitled to oversimplify it.

He referred in detail to a "three-storey edifice" in his effort to describe the new Pact: That is, the external dimension, the management of the external borders and the internal rules, which ensure solidarity with the member-states that receive the pressure of migration.

Regarding the external dimension, Schinas stressed, among other things, that this is a global phenomenon that requires global solutions and division of responsibilities.

Regarding the sound management of the external borders, he stressed that there will be a new and mandatory control mechanism at all borders, which will allow the direct guidance of people in the right process, with strong monitoring mechanisms of fundamental rights to ensure that this is done correctly. "A process without congestion, gaps and black holes," he said. And this system will be strengthened with a European coordinator and Frontex properly playing its role as an operational arm."

On the third floor of our virtual building, Schinas said, we find the stable but fair internal rules. "We decided to support it in the concept of continuous and substantial solidarity," he stressed.

A credible European migration system must be able to provide effective solidarity in practice for those member-states that are facing migration problems due to their location, and the new Pact will offer strong solidarity mechanisms. In the new system, solidarity becomes the rule. "We want a new concept of taking responsibility," he said, referring in particular to the three typical cases of solidarity between member-states concerning the return mechanism, rescue and the risk of pressure from migratory flows.

In conclusion, Schinas referred to the future proposals to be submitted by the European Commission under the umbrella of the new Pact: In the coming months, a new strategy for the future of Schengen will be presented and a proposal for legal migration, which will be submitted next year, after the completion of the relevant public consultation, which started yesterday.