António Costa denounces the instrumentalization of migration as a threat to the integrity of the EU

The president of the European Council, Antonio Costa, has denounced the use of migratory flows as a tool against the borders of the European Union, placing the massive entry of 72,000 immigrants in Ceuta among the most recent examples.

"The European Union has been facing a new experience for seven years: the instrumentalization of migration as a new way of threatening our territorial integrity," he stated during his speech at the Ambrossetti Forum, one of the most prestigious international economic and geopolitical conferences in the world held in the Italian town of Cernobbio.

The president has compared the situation in Ceuta with that experienced on other external borders of the EU. "We have seen it on the border between Poland and Belarus. We have seen it on the border between Greece and Turkey. And we have now seen it on the border between Morocco and the entrance to Ceuta," he noted, stressing that Europe must be able to identify this type of situation, act against it and "fight against it."

Costa himself had already pointed out at the end of August after meeting in Vilnius with the president of Lithuania, Gitanas Nauseda, that the "instrumentalization of migration" is "totally unacceptable" when it occurs on the external borders of the European Union and had expressly included Ceuta among the affected scenarios. He then called for "a joint European response" and "a secure and strong Europe."

In his speech today, the President of the European Council also defended that the fight against irregular immigration must be supported by "having good agreements with the countries of origin, with the countries of transit."