The shame of Europe over migrant boat people

The steadily increasing flow of migrants and asylum seekers attempting to reach Europe via the Mediterranean represents one of the biggest challenges confronting the EU.

This week, 400 people drowned at sea after setting off from Libya while 8,500 were rescued by the Italian coastguard. Public anguish in many EU states over immigration makes the problem in the Mediterranean difficult to resolve. Still Europe's response should be condemned for what it is: inadequate and inhumane.

The continent has long been a magnet for migrants from its southern and eastern borders. Upheaval across the Middle East and north Africa, and in particular the lawlessness in Libya, have turned a chronic problem into a crisis. Some 220,000 migrants reached the EU by sea in 2014, four times as many as the previous year. More than 3,200 drowned in the attempt and many predict the 2015 figure will be even higher.

The Mediterranean is the world's deadliest migration route. EU policies have made it even more dangerous. Until last autumn, the Italian government funded an elaborate operation called Mare Nostrum that conducted search-and-rescue operations across the Mediterranean. Italy balked at footing the monthly €9m bill for the exercise. In November, it was replaced by a smaller EU operation at one-third of the cost that is focused on border control rather than search-and-rescue.

European governments believe the narrower scope of the EU mission is justified. As a UK Foreign Office minister recently argued, Mare Nostrum created "an unintended pull factor encouraging more migrants to attempt the dangerous sea crossing and thereby leading to more tragic and unnecessary deaths". By scaling back the rescue operation, EU governments believe migrants will be deterred from making the crossing in the first place.

Yet the ending of Mare Nostrum has done nothing to discourage refugees, who are driven by desperation and criminally seduced by traffickers. Some 700 people have been lost at sea this year compared with about 17 in the equivalent period of 2014. Besides, the effective abandonment of search-and-rescue missions by the EU is morally reprehensible. If people risk losing their lives, no civilised government should compromise in saving them.

In the next few weeks, the commission will unveil a "comprehensive migration agenda". There should be no doubt what it needs to do. EU member states should club together to fund a proper search-and-rescue mission in the Mediterranean. Where possible, they should set up asylum centres in neighbouring states that can manage migration flows and do not compromise on refugees' human rights.

Above all, EU nations should abandon their grudging approach to refugee numbers. In December, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees appealed to the EU to provide 130,000 resettlement places for Syrians displaced by the civil war. This is comfortably within the scope of what a bloc of 500m people can manage. As of last month, Germany and Sweden had pledged to take 30,000 and 2,700 respectively. The remaining 26 EU states are taking 5,438 between them. Britain is taking 143.

The overwhelming challenge facing Europe today is the future of its economy and of the eurozone. Millions of jobs and political stability depend on the outcome.

Events in the Mediterranean should provoke a crisis of conscience and of memory. Europeans cannot call themselves civilised if they fail to respond generously to people seeking salvation on their own continent.

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