Illegal migration: Europe may be in for riots and uprisings

The Migration Research Institute and the Waclaw Felczak Institute of Polish-Hungarian Cooperation have held a joint conference on the most important political, security, social and economic challenges of irregular mass migration this week. The first panel discussed the price of migration and its effect of European politics and societies, and also the problems associated with with war refugees, work-related migration and illegal migration to the EU.

He also cited a historical example related to Hungary: the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy was a bloc consisting many languages, cultures and religions, but it was not multicultural.

Those cultures were not equal, and the culture to adapt to was clearly defined, 

Schoellhammer pointed out.

Most of the migrants do not accept European values

Tomasz Grzegorz Grosse, professor of political science and European studies at the University of Warsaw also approached the issue of migration from the direction of identities. The greatest problem is that most of the arrivals do not share the European identity, which leads to the formation of parallel societies not only in a country, but even within a single town, he opined.

On the one hand, this leads to a waste of budgetary resources, as it is impossible to integrate those who reject the culture of the host country and whose strong Muslim identity prevents them from accepting European values, let alone the prevalent leftist values of the European Union. On the other hand, it greatly increases the rate of crime and even the chances of the occurrence of terrorist acts, and leads to polarization and radicalization on both sides; just think of the rise of right-wing extremist movements.

If it goes on like this, Europe may be in for riots and even uprisings,

Grosse warned, inferring among other things the unrest in France in the summer.

Number of people equivalent to a big city

The population of Italy has gone through a steep decline due to the alarmingly low birth rates, so it needs workforce, said Piotr Kowalczuk, editor at the Polish Radio and Roman correspondent of the daily Rzeczpospolita. Immigration, however, must be controlled and legal, he underlined.

The Dublin Regulation delegates the problem to the country of entry. Regardless of the fact that countries reject 70 percent of asylum applications, the migrants still stay, or possibly leave for France, Germany or Scandinavia.

We are talking about some 600 thousand illegal immigrants, equivalent to the population of a big city, whose whereabouts and activities are unknown to the authorities.

As they have to make a living, many of them choose a life of crime or they are taken advantage of by organized crime. 31 percent of prison inmates are foreigners, mostly North Africans.

 

Does successful integration exist?

Are there examples of the successful integration of people from other cultures in Europe? The experts agreed that there are, citing as examples the integration of Latin-American communities in Portugal, Spain or even in Germany. People from Vietnam have also integrated well into French society, and there are even examples of the successful integration of Muslim immigrants in Europe, namely, that of the Iranians in Germany.

It all depends on the extent the immigrants want to get integrated,

the experts said in conclusion.

Cover photo: panelists at the conference of the Migration Research Institute and the Waclaw Felczak Polish-Hungarian Cooperation Institute. (Photo: Magyar Nemzet)