The price of friendship
Civitas, 1 September 2010
Monday marked the two year anniversary of the signing of the ‘Friendship Treaty’ on immigration between Italy and Libya, writes Natalie Hamill. Visiting Italy for the fourth time this year, Colonel Gaddafi punctuated his visit with several provocative claims, not least that the EU should pay Libya €5 billion a year to stop migration flows to the EU, and that Europeans should convert to Islam. Gaddafi lectured those willing to listen (mainly a parade of young women hired from an Italian model agency) on the virtues of Islam as the ‘ultimate religion’; three of the girls ‘converted’, to complete the stunt.
Many Italians find the relationship between their Prime Minister and Colonel Gaddafi embarrassing, with one think tank saying ‘Italy has become the Disneyland of Gaddafi and his senile vanities.’ However, despite the hilarity these two leaders provide for the media, the lucrative business deals (Libya is rich in oil) that follow in the Colonel’s wake seem to make his presence more tolerable. An even larger incentive for putting up with Gaddafi’s odd behaviour is the need to have Libya on side to tackle immigration – namely the crossing of migrants in boats from Libya to Italy – but just how much is Italy willing to pay to secure Libya’s cooperation?
Libya is Africa’s gateway to Europe. Every year, thousands of Africans risk their lives and savings to attempt the perilous crossing to the Italian island of Lampedusa. The tiny island is one of the closest European territories to Libya and it represents a chance at Italian citizenship, which if granted, thanks to the EU’s Schengen Agreement, would allow migrants to move freely within the EU. The boats attempting to reach Lampedusa are often overcrowded and badly equipped, the journeys are long, and in many cases the migrants are from Western and sub-Sahara African countries and have already endured harrowing journeys just to reach the Libyan coastline.
Immigration is an explosive subject in Italy. Only a couple of years ago Italy was struggling to cope with a huge influx of migrants and asylum seekers, usually coming on boats from Libya. However, in 2008 Italy signed the ‘Treaty on Friendship, Partnership and Cooperation’ with Libya, with the result that the ‘boat people’ found in international waters would be returned to Libya to have their cases ‘processed’ by humanitarian organisations.
Has this ‘push-back’ agreement been a success? It has undoubtedly kept migrants away from Italy – the number of migrants reaching Italian shores has dropped considerably since the treaty came into practice in April 2009 (by about 90%). There is also a planned border satellite project designed to tackle immigration across the Libyan border. For many the deal was worth the flip side – a guarantee of $5 billion for infrastructure projects in Libya over the next 20 years – at this price Berlusconi (and many other EU states) are happy to overlook serious concerns over the plight of migrants returned to Libya, (just this week, Amnesty International implored the Italian Prime Minister to challenge Gaddafi on his country’s appalling human rights record).
Now Gaddafi hopes to ‘deepen bilateral arrangements’, claiming Tripoli needs €5 billion per year to halt migration flows ‘or Europe will become Africa’. His threat to re-open the ‘floodgates’ of migration, unless the EU pays through the nose to secure Libya’s borders, demonstrates the EU may need to explore other ways of managing the migration of the African boat people. Behind the facade of friendship, beautiful models and purebred horses, it seems Gaddafi is a volatile partner, happy to hold the EU hostage for his own ends.