The
end of Schengen
How
a human tsunami has shattered a European dream.
“Free
movement around 26 countries for 400 million Europeans is now
seriously threatened.”
By MICHAEL BINYON
9/14/15, 10:34 AM CET Updated 9/14/15, 11:37 AM CET
LONDON — No
country is more committed to European integration than Germany. All
the grand schemes to bring Europeans together — the single
currency, the push for common policies, the abolition of frontier
controls within the European Union — have Germany at their heart.
But Berlin’s
announcement Sunday that it is to reimpose frontier controls with
Austria strikes a deadly blow at of one of the few agreements that
has turned these visions into reality — the Schengen treaty, which
removed passport controls along thousands of miles of Europe’s
frontiers.
Is Schengen now
dead? And is this the beginning of the end for an “ever closer
union” in Europe?
* * *
Germany insists that
its new border check points are temporary, an emergency response to
the thousands of migrants pouring in from the south. When the human
tsunami dies down, the interior minister suggested, these controls
will be lifted, the trains from Austria will start running again and
Germany will continue to champion a Europe without borders.
It sounds like
wishful thinking.
For more than a
year, Europe has been struggling with an ever-increasing flow of
desperate migrants — refugees from wars and persecution in Syria,
Iraq, Libya and Afghanistan, young men fleeing dictatorship in
Eritrea, poor people from across Africa and the Middle East seeking a
better life. They have been smuggled across the Mediterranean in
leaky boats, transported like cattle in airless lorries, forced by
gangs to clamber across frontiers in Turkey, Greece and the Balkans.
And almost all have had one destination: Germany.
Altogether,
estimates say, some 800,000 may arrive in Germany in one year. And
Germany, like Sweden, the only other European nation to have offered
shelter to so many, now finds that its voters have had enough. Unless
the flow is cut back or stopped, there will be riots, violence and
racial attacks. Angela Merkel’s government is reeling and populists
are denouncing cherished European principles.
This is not the
first time a country has temporarily reimposed border controls,
permitted under the 1985 Schengen treaty (now incorporated in EU law)
in cases of emergency or national security. But the move comes as the
clamor for a permanent crack-down becomes ever louder, not only in
Germany but also in France, Italy, Hungary and the European
heartlands.
It is not only the
refugee crisis that has exposed the failings of a frontier-free
Europe: the exploitation by organized crime of the open borders to
escape into other countries, safe in the knowledge that there will be
no hot pursuit and little police intelligence to catch them, has
caused rising anger and frustration.
And then there is
terrorism. The recent attempted murders by a gunman on a train from
Amsterdam to Paris highlighted the ease with which terrorists can
travel across borders to plot massacres. Interior and transport
ministers warned after an emergency meeting in Paris there would have
to be more spot checks, proper cross-frontier intelligence and
amendments to Schengen to impose controls when necessary.
This triple assault
means that free movement around 26 countries for 400 million
Europeans is now seriously threatened. Many Europeans look enviously
at Britain and Ireland, which were granted opt-outs when the treaty
was signed, and still retain full border inspections — with some
notable success in stopping terrorists and catching illegal
immigrants. No such option is open to anyone else. The 1997 Amsterdam
treaty insisted that any new EU applicant had to remove internal
frontiers. Three non-EU members, Switzerland, Iceland and Norway,
have already joined in. Three new members, Romania, Bulgaria and
Cyprus, will be forced to do so soon.
European idealists
and those desperate to keep frontiers passport-free argue that new
border checks would not solve any problems. The challenges are mostly
from outside Europe. The refugees will keep coming, they say, and
human traffickers will still evade border police. Terrorism knows no
frontiers. And organized crime often has its roots far beyond Europe.
They argue that political crises in the Middle East — war,
extremism and religious persecution — must still be resolved, and
border controls treat the symptoms rather than the causes.
These are poor
arguments. Schengen, the treaty bearing the name of the little
Luxembourg town where it was signed, has two massive weaknesses that
have never been properly tackled. First, it will only work if
Europe’s common external frontier is massively strengthened. But
where is this frontier? Often in countries least able to cope,
running between Greece and Turkey, Malta and Libya, Hungary and
Serbia, Sicily (Italy) and Tunisia. Only a paltry sum has been given
to Frontex, the EU border force, to boost patrols, stop drug
smugglers and check migrants. Secondly, the intelligence formerly
gathered at frontier posts is never now properly passed on. Countries
have no way of tracking who is entering or leaving unless police data
is routinely made available.
The real weakness of
Schengen, however, is that it runs counter to the growing mood in
Europe.
This is more
nationalist, more insular, suspicious of Brussels, skeptical of
pan-European solutions, resentful of paying out for poorer neighbors,
determined to reassert more local control and angry at the remoteness
of decision-making. It is not a pretty or an idealistic mood. It has
been fanned by the repeated crises over the euro, a growing
north-south divide, austerity, slow economic growth and Europe’s
utter failure to find common solutions to the tragedies of migration
and asylum.
* * *
While Brussels
dithers, populist parties demand quick national solutions. Little
wonder that Marine Le Pen is said to be on course to win power in
France or that smaller countries accuse Germany of imposing austerity
on all of them. Schengen is in danger of being the first victim of
this mood, as governments scramble to show voters that they are in
command.
A blanket
re-imposition of border posts would be hugely expensive, cause
massive delays and anger tourists and businessmen alike. But not
everyone needs to be stopped. Passport controls could be selective,
based on intelligence or random inspections. The mere possibility of
interrogation would strengthen security across Europe. It works in
Britain and Ireland. Germany may find that having imposed checks with
Austria, it will now have to do the same on every frontier if human
trafficking is to be halted.
And despite the
wailings of European idealists, the general public would not object.
Schengen’s days are numbered.
Michael Binyon is a
foreign affairs analyst and former diplomatic editor of the Times of
London.
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