Europe hardens the right of asylum

The progressive Spanish government is preparing a new regulation of the right to asylum that will restrict access to this right recognized by the United Nations, which was previously considered "international legality". The content of this new regulation, conditioned by the demands of the European Commission, is being disseminated as a sounding board, adding many more reasons for the rejection of asylum applications, the legal path used by millions of people in the world to flee political persecution or the warlike conflicts that may take place in their countries of origin. Furthermore, it makes access to detention centres for foreigners more difficult, where those who are pending expulsion because they arrived in Spain without legal documentation are admitted. 

The origin of the hardening of the right of asylum in Europe has been in the sieve that has been the granting of these permits for people whose situation clearly fit in the consideration of immigrants, and not refugees. Now, applying this new position in the EU, it is intended that the deadlines for applying for asylum protected by Article 14 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights will be shorter, which in practice will result in fewer permits being granted or greater difficulty for applicants in obtaining the permit. 
    
The legislative novelty promises to be controversial because it has been drawn up by the Ministry of the Interior, without the participation or record of the more "social" departments of the Spanish executive, those occupied by the United Nations. There are two possibilities in the face of this change: either Pablo Iglesias will prioritize his institutional suit and disregard his own past political positions on reception, or there will be a discrepancy, in public or in private, with the other socialist half of the Government. In any case, there will be an internal debate, as is already happening after the European ruling that endorses the hot-foot return of illegal immigrants who try to enter Spanish territory by force through the borders of Ceuta and Melilla.

The progressive soul of the Cabinet is bumping into reality. Read more. The government of British Prime Minister Boris Johnson is going to make it more difficult to receive immigrants who do not come with their jobs guaranteed. A contract that guarantees them a minimum wage of thirty thousand pounds a year. In the United Kingdom this measure has put the opposition and employers on their guard, who are anticipating the negative effect this will have on the availability of cheaper employment within their borders. Priti Patel, the newly-ratified Home Secretary, has wasted no time after the change of government and has announced the new law that will regulate the entry of foreign citizens after they leave the European Union. And as we feared during the long and tortuous Brexit process, the restrictions are increasing. Workers who do not know English or do not have a proven work qualification will have to go back where they came from. The Prime Minister's refusal to allow the free movement of people knows no bounds, as demonstrated by the announcement of such a hasty rule just a few weeks after the flight from the community club and only one week after his government of isolation was formed. In the United States it has been "America First". In the United Kingdom they try to give priority to the capacity of national employees by rejecting foreigners, a policy they will regret before they believe.

All this is happening precisely when the UN has just warned of the new exodus that is being prepared in Syria, almost a million more people who are going to leave the country, which has been punished by a decade of war, in particular from the city of Idlib. The Syrian Government's attacks in that northern area, which almost borders Turkey, will move an underprivileged population that can no longer cope and is heading for Europe, as happened during the migration crisis of 2015, when the flight of refugees was mixed with immigration for socio-economic reasons and the result was widespread hand washing in the EU with regard to this problem.