The absurdity and lethality of European national policies towards migration has once again risen towards public consciousness in recent weeks, without any indication that national politicians intend to do anything other than continue to promote myths of national egoism and self-sufficiency, whether or not covered by an often cynical sheen of humanitarian concern. Here are some of the recent news stories: In response to the humanitarian situation in Calais, the French interior minister disbanded the camp known as the ‘jungle’, without any apparent provisions for the migrants dispersed, and denied the plans for a new detention centre announced by the British home office minister who seems to believe Britain has the special right to profit from a precarious migrant class but blame failures in administering to migrants on other countries. Meanwhile, Italy and Malta played a similar, ongoing, and by definition interminable game of shifting the responsibility for migrants found at sea between them, trying to avoid adding to the numbers in already heavily overcrowded and riotous detention centres. Italy was again condemned by the European Council for deporting migrants to countries which practice torture and for various acts of discrimination, to add to its condemnation for racism and disregard of Human rights by the United Nations in March. Médecins Sans Frontières produced a report on the deplorable and inhuman conditions in detention centres in Malta. Most serious of all at least another 200 people died in a capsized ship heading towards Italy, taking the total of those killed at the borders of Europe to over 14000 since 1988 (according to the newspaper review effected by fortresseurope.blogspot.com). There is nothing exceptional about any of this, nor about the public or political responses to these events. They simply add to the already convincing case for the desperate need for a coordinated European migration policy: the European Union is the only level at which the rights and dignity of the migrants could effectively be protected, the benefits and burdens of migration fairly distributed amongst the peoples of Europe, and at which partnerships for genuine development promoting both solidarity and mobility in origin countries could be most successfully run. Although there are some European policies that try to make these things a priority, the centre of political ground on the issue seems to be increasingly moving towards a securitarian agenda which has ever less to do with either human dignity or rights, and is ever more detached even from political realism. The European Parliament adopted in April a report on a Common Immigration Policy For Europe prepared by the Conservative Maltese MEP Simon Busuttil, which places the emphasis on reinforcing border controls and the powers of FRONTEX, and continues to insist on the not only undesirable and unjust but also completely implausible policy that all ‘irregular’ migrants in Europe must be forced to return to their countries of origin. In the UK alone there are over 50,000 irregular migrants. In Italy this figure is over 10 times larger. In the whole of the European Union there are estimated to be roughly 8 million irregular migrants, and no matter how much the powers of those who control and police Europe’s borders are increased these numbers are unlikely to do anything but grow. Political priorities and political delusions seem to have changed little from the adoption of the Returns Directive in June 2008, which allows for the detention of people for up to 18 months simply for not being able to produce legitimating papers. The recent report by Médecins Sans Frontières on the often abysmal conditions in Maltese detention centres shows that a period much shorter than this would most likely be seriously detrimental to both mental and physical health. A small potential saving grace of the report adopted by the Parliament is a clause inserted after much struggle, and much to the consternation of the Conservative parties, to propose that migrants should be allowed to vote in local elections, and become part of political parties and trade unions. This extremely meek proposal, which many more progressively-inclined Europeans might mistakenly suppose is already the case, would do something to address the internal borders of European political society which exist for, as many have underlined, the metaphor of ‘fortress Europe’ mistakenly gives the impression that the borders to Europe are merely geographical. In fact, European societies are protected, insulated and policed in a huge variety of ways, such that the borders run throughout the fabrics of everyday life. Even in a non-legislatively binding report such as this adopted by the European Parliament, however, our ‘European’ representatives still feel the need to specify that ultimately it is up to the member states of Europe to adopt such ‘integration’ measures. According to estimates by the Migreurop group (www.migreurop.org) there around 180 detention centres for migrants located in Europe, and an increasing number situated in North African and Middle Eastern countries and Turkey. The majority of these centres are closed to NGOs and other observers, and there are steps being taken to make it even more difficult for access in France and other European countries, whilst access to camps in non-EU member states is almost impossible. It is therefore unlikely that a migrant detained inside will have access to legal advice for protection under even the most basic human rights laws that exist at an international level. Access for external observers to these camps is an absolutely fundamental condition for Europe to be able to say it believes in upholding human rights at all. Yet the campaign launched by migreurop for such access seems to have been largely ignored in the European Parliament’s report – which instead proposes ‘Return Counselling Services’ to be established in open and closed camps to give advice on return assistance, without any indication such services will involve external observers or advice on rights in general. Migration is widely recognised as the crucial worldwide political issue for the coming century, and there is no area of politics which in which it does not enter. Europe is the crucible in which these politics will largely be played out, and the majority of decision makers seem to be becoming more and more securitarian – it is therefore as urgent as ever that a coalition for a progressive migration policy in Europe at a transnational level be built and supported.