European border guards, a great idea. Corn…

(B2) A body of European border guards and coast guards, the idea is old. But it could never be implemented, as we wrote recently. Quite simply, because a majority of States were opposed to it fairly quickly. From this idea was born a substitute, " the European Agency for the Management of Operational Cooperation at the External Borders of the Member States of the European Union », better known by its acronym Frontex (read: Live from the Frontex situation room).

If the name was long, it also said what Frontex was: just an operational management body. Which, in itself, was ambitious. Today this agency does not have all the necessary means. When there is a need, recognized by all, as at the borders of Greece, it must launch a call for personnel and funding. And these calls are not always really answered. States are reluctant to send personnel and equipment, sometimes simply because they have other things to do (Read: Inside Frontex).

Sometimes it is the same people who complain of seeing the borders poorly defended or seeing migrants arriving by the hundreds. Witness: the last call for contributions for some 700 personnel which was only painfully half filled. It was time to move on.

A brave decision

The will of the Commission led by Jean-Claude Juncker to propose, from the outset, the creation of a European body of border guards, without going through an intermediate stage, is to be welcomed. It is a necessity today if we want to maintain a certain serenity on the European continent. Even if this measure may seem brutal, we have too often spoken, in the past, of the first stage without moving on to the second, so as not to want to be more decisive today. In fact, most States prefer a European body, even if it is not their first choice, to porous, poorly guarded borders, where the State concerned has only few means to oppose...

The decision-making methods to be reviewed

On the other hand, we can have a little more doubt about the provisions contained in the draft regulation proposed today allowing the will of a State to be overridden to impose the presence of border guards. This provision may seem justified with regard to certain latency periods, when the State where a crisis is taking place takes time to react. This was the case for Greece recently (read: Greece calls on Europe for help. It was time !). But we must be wary of measures that are too circumstantial. This measure runs the risk of unnecessarily upsetting many countries with sensitive sovereignty, particularly in Eastern Europe. Do not blame them quickly. They have their reasons, or even just right!

Legally questionable...

From a legal point of view, it seems difficult for the Commission to impose a measure of force, which obliges a State to accept forces from another country, which will intervene in its place, performing sovereign functions, such as intervening in uniform , armed, arrest people. In international law, this would mean having a United Nations Security Council resolution with recourse to Chapter VII.

... as historically

In historical terms, this is to forget the role played by border guards in the communist system of the USSR and still today in Russia. The “greens” were an integral component of the Soviet intelligence system (KGB then FSB), intended to ensure order, alongside the “blues”—the political police. Moreover, the notion of forced assistance can resonate in a strange way in reference to the story. The USSR did not hesitate to use this notion to force its neighbors to lend it a “strong hand”.

or politically

Times have certainly changed. And the spirit of the Commission is quite different. It is a matter of strengthening the external borders to preserve free movement within European borders, to save Schengen. But the story is still alive. we must pay attention to symbols... And imposing certain measures on a State against its will could prove dangerous in the long term.

A provision that could waltz

On the Commission side, we seem to be aware – from what I understood – of having gone “a little far” and ready to abandon this provision. It is rather an element like a few others, intended to serve as a counterpart in the negotiation which will now begin within the body of European legislation (Council of Member States of the EU and European Parliament). Let's hope that this "provocation" will not serve as a pretext for some to refuse the whole project.

(Nicolas Gros-Verheyde)

Read our file: No. 30. Guard the borders of Europe. Towards a European Coast Guard and Border Guard