Fine Gael MEPs criticised for voting against move to enhance rescue operations for migrants

So what's the story?

There are 4 Fine Gael MEPs elected to the European Parliament and they are Mairéad McGuinness, Maria Walsh, Frances Fitzgerald and Seán Kelly. The European Parliament rejected a vote, by two votes, asking member states to step up efforts to save asylum seekers making the perilous crossing on Thursday Oct 24th last. The Fine Gael MEPs who are in the Peoples Party Grouping in the EU Parliament sided with the Far Right Grouping and the their votes were crucial to the defeat of this resolution. So what was the resolution?

The resolution calls on the “EU Member States to enhance proactive search and rescue operations by providing sufficient vessels and equipment specifically dedicated to search and rescue operations and personnel, along the routes where they can make an effective contribution to the preservation of lives”

It also asks “to step up their efforts in support of search and rescue operations in the Mediterranean”.

The resolution calls on all actors in the Mediterranean to proactively transmit information related to persons in distress at sea to the competent authorities for search and rescue operations and to, where appropriate, any potential vessels in the vicinity that could imminently engage in search and rescue. When questioned the Irish MEPS offered the excuse that to share information could also alert traffickers to the location of migrants in distress. This argument was rubbished by all who heard it. Maria Walsh gave a car-crash account of the reasons why she voted against the resolution. You can hear this RTE interview here. This vote was held on the day after 39 people were found dead, concealed in a refrigerated trailer having lost their lives in pursuit of a new life abroad.

There have been 1,078 recorded drownings in the Mediterranean in 2019, according to the Missing Migrants Project, which tracks the deaths of migrants, including refugees and asylum seekers, who have gone missing along mixed migration routes worldwide.

Una Mullaly commenting in the Irish Times of Oct 28th offered "No one is saying that these Fine Gael MEPs don’t care about people drowning in the Mediterranean. They’re not monsters. But teaming up with far-right politicians in the parliament, who cheered when the vote was lost, is, frankly, disgusting."

“The motion fell by two votes, further adding to a damning record of the EU on the deepening humanitarian crisis,” said Martina Anderson who charged the European Parliament with failure to commit to protecting human life in the Mediterranean. This was a humanitarian resolution that was brought before the parliament by the Spanish who are concerned about the "Fortress Europe" mentality that does it's utmost to exclude those who make perilous journeys. This resolution was also concerned with the decriminalisation of those who rescue those drowning and this could indeed be seen as a death sentence for the travelling migrants. At the very least it can put the NGOs at risk of criminalisation should they pluck someone from the sea. They could be charged with trafficking when they come into port. Maria Walsh was asked on Morning Ireland if she was proud of her achievement and her interview only went downhill from there. Fine Gael need to think out their position again. It was not their finest hour and I suspect that those who voted for them may well indeed have felt let down by their alignment with the far-right.

More here from the Journal.ie

And from the Irish Independent here (A comprehensive article here)

Trump and the Wall - the Lies:

The Oval office tried to justify (Jan 8^th 2019) the federal government shutdown. Trump needed to convince at least some of the 57% of the public who oppose his WALL that such a wall is needed and that there is indeed a humanitarian crisis. Those who live in the border states of Texas and Arizona have no appetite for this wall as it would interrupt their water supply and look unsightly as it cuts across their land. Up to 60% of the public believe Trump to be dishonest and in particular when it comes to issues related to immigration.

1. Almost all of the 4000 potential terrorists that are known to the US government who attempted to come to the US did so via airports and ports and not across the Southern Border as was claimed. (In fact only about a dozen of those of the watch-list attempted to cross the Southern Border)

2. What will the wall be made from? At one time he said concrete but now he is moving from this.

3. He claimed that some of the former Presidents told him that they should have built this wall. This is in fact untrue.

4. Mexico will now not pay for this wall as he had claimed they would in revised trade deals. In fact the amount gained in such a new deal would be dwarfed by the cost of the wall.

5. Most drugs that come into the United States come in via ports and not across the Southern Border.

6. What of keeping those criminals away from the US by building this wall. The fact is that illegal immigrants mostly do their level best to stay away from the authorities for fear of drawing attention to themselves in case of deportation.

7. Federal Government employees are in favour of the wall. This is also untrue.

8. What of the Humanitarian Crisis that was mentioned in the lead up to the address. There is no doubt that those on the move are vulnerable and any arising crisis is exacerbated by the splitting up of the families that has been ongoing at the border by the Trump administration. “Having spent the past two years describing undocumented immigrants as thugs and murderers, and instituting border policies that separated thousands of migrant children from their parents for extended periods, Trump now sought to portray himself as a concerned observer”. New Yorker

Trump had reportedly been working with White House staff to create justification to declare a national emergency to build the wall unilaterally, but didn’t step this far during his address. “The president has chosen fear. We want to start with the facts,” Pelosi (speaker of the house) said afterwards. It is now the case that because of the Trump fixation with the wall and the aim to achieve this “by any means” has resulted in a government shutdown and an obvious distortion of the facts with the result that his credibility is slipping. (This is the White House view). More than this upwards of 800,000 workers are on leave without pay or are working to keep essential services open and operational without any payment.

BOT 09/01/2019