Italy and France at Loggerheads over Illegal Immigrants

Sunday, France took the unprecedented step of closing its border with Italy in an effort to prevent illegal Tunisian immigrants from entering French territory.

The immigrants regularly land on the Italian island of Lampedusa and Italian immigration authorities process and find shelter for them in Italy.  Last week, the Italian government felt overwhelmed by the continuing flow of illegal Tunisian and other North African immigrants using the Italian island of Lampedusa, which is closer to Tunisia than it is to the Italian mainland, to enter the European Union (EU). So, exasperated with unsuccessful attempts to pay the Tunisian government sufficient funds to take back the illegal immigrants and care for them in Tunisia, Italy issued 6-month visa and residency permits to more than 20,000 of them. This in principle authorizes them to cross the Italian border and enter France and other EU countries. And, that is exactly their goal - to head north out of Italy into France and other northern EU countries where they have family or expect to find better job opportunities.  

France responded by closing it border with Italy at Vintimille, the last Italian town before the French border leading to Nice and the Cote d’Azur. This is, in strict legal terms, forbidden because a person holding a visa and residency permit for one EU country can freely travel and stay in any EU country.

French militants on the Italian trains with the immigrants protested when the trains were stopped and finally sat on the rail tracks. The French said they had closed the frontier because the local French regional government had asked them to do so in an effort to avoid manifestations and public disorder. The French also said they normally demand passports and proof of means of support for entry, which the Tunisians could not supply.

Late in the afternoon, the Tunisians dispersed southward back into Italy and the French border at Vintimille was re-opened. The French estimated that 20 of the immigrants entered France.

This incident illustrates several points :

- The explosion in the number of illegal immigrants coming to Italy’s Lampedusa in order to enter EU territory has swamped Italian authorities who cannot possibly care for them.

- The EU policy of open borders among its member countries works well when there is no outside pressure, but when floods of illegal immigrants push to enter EU territory, the rules do not work because they were never meant to deal with such situations.

- Italy has exploded the myth of open EU internal borders by issuing temporary permits to the Tunisian illegal immigrants, in the hope of ridding itself of the problem and foisting it onto France, which would not honor the Italian documents.

The situation has reached crisis level and we can expect the EU to try to do something to accommodate Italy while protecting its other member countries from being overrun with immigrants they cannot afford to care for and who cannot possibly find proper housing or work in the EU.