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Malta hails EU immigration burden sharing project
Published in Saudi Press Agency on 04 - 06 - 2009

Malta welcomed the EU Justice Ministers' decision today to use the small Mediterranean island for a
pilot project intended to ease the immigration burden, according to dpa.
The Commission has been given the mandate by member states to
launch a pilot intra-community voluntary relocation programme for
Malta.
The news was given in Luxembourg by EU Justice Commissioner
Jacques Barrot during an EU meeting of Justice and Home Affairs
Ministers.
Barrot said this was a very important step in Malta's fight
against illegal immigration as it was not only the first time that
such a programme would be introduced but it would also translate into
action the statements of solidarity from member states.
EU sources told The Times of Malta newspaper that the programme
should be up and running this summer and would provide the
opportunity for refugees and those with humanitarian protection in
Malta to resettle in other EU member states.
The EU programme will be modelled on a similar programme currently
operated between Malta and the US.
Malta's EU Justice Minister Carm Mifsud Bonnici told the German
Press Agency dpa: "The EU is replying to the plight of this country.
It is a very good and significant step forward. The EU doesn't act
fast, but it does act."
The issue was put on the front burner after Barrot recently
visited Malta, where he saw the overcrowded detention centres, amid
an unusual surge of immigrants from Africa during the winter months.
Mifsud Bonnici said that a number of EU states remained reluctant
to accept any obligatory arrangement which would bind them to take a
number of immigrants - but that did not mean that Europe could find
no solution. He also called for the EU to rope in Libya and Turkey to
try to stem the flow of immigrants.
He said the EU's border control agency Frontex will also be given
a brief to act tougher with those immigrants who deserve no
protection. The Warsaw-based agency will soon be making a proposal to
start some of its regular joint return flights directly from Malta.


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