Rush to close gates to the promised land

Driven by war and starvation in Africa, economic collapse in the

former communist empire, political oppression in Asia, or merely the

simple desire for a better life, millions have come to see Europe as the

promised land. As asylum-seekers, refugees or mere opportunists, the new

migrants -- or the unfounded fear of them -- have caused governments to

reassess their attitude to aliens

But is there really a crisis? Or are the numbers involved trivial, a

pretext for unscrupulous politicians playing the race card? Can we be

proud of the way we treat those who come seeking refuge? Is the redrawn

map of Europe little more than a blueprint for ethnic tensions? Or does

it mark the emergence of a Fortress Europe dedicated only to its own

well-being?

In a special analysis of a problem set to dominate the international

political agenda as the century draws to a close, Herald writers examine

the myths and the reality of the modern exodus.

''When people have no future they will take to the road. And they will

travel westwards''

CHANCELLOR KOHL

AFTER the thaw, the avalanche. Most of the problems facing Europe in

the post-communist, post-1992 world are tractable. Economic convergence,

a joint foreign policy, the role of the European Parliament -- each has

the potential for solution given goodwill and hard work. The same cannot

be said of immigration.

As yet the issue has barely impinged on public consciousness and there

are few signs that European leaders, each with a domestic constituency

to please or placate, are giving it the attention it deserves. Yet at a

time when economic barriers are replacing iron curtains, it could easily

become the dominant issue of the twentieth century's last decade.

Germany's Chancellor Kohl is one statesman who has shown an awareness

of what might lie ahead. Speaking of the Soviet Union's collapse, he

said recently: ''When people have no future they will take to the road.

And they will travel westwards.''

Given his country's geographical position, Kohl can be forgiven for

adopting that perspective. Battling with the economic aftermath of

German unification, he has reason to fear a flood of refugees from the

former communist countries.

But the problem is not Germany's alone. All the nations of Western

Europe which once had to contend only with the legacies of their

imperial pasts, with occasional refugees or with guest workers, now talk

of invasion. And the invasion they fear, if it comes, will be on two

fronts.

It is the road to paranoia, if not perdition. Yet many European

leaders have found there is political capital to be made by feeding

latent (and sometimes not so latent) racism. French politicians were

engaged all summer in a disreputable competition to show who can be

toughest on the immigrant problem. The Italian Government displayed no

reluctance in dealing harshly with desperate Albanians fleeing economic

chaos at home. In Sweden, the Social Democrats recently lost power

largely because of the success of a ''fun'' party trading on

anti-immigrant feeling. Britain is ''tightening up'' on asylum seekers

and Kohl, for all his percipience, knows that neo-Nazis bent on keeping

out Poles, Gipsies, Jews and anyone else from the East are gaining in

strength. ''Fortress Europe'' is emerging as something more than just a

nightmare for American and Japanese businessmen.

Perhaps because it is unprovable, anecdotal evidence is more alarming

than the facts. An immigration officer working at Heathrow, who prefers

to remain nameless, will tell you any number of stories about the way

non-white arrivals are routinely harassed. In the south of France the

cafe gossip is that German neo-Nazis are bussed regularly to Marseilles

and given a handful of change to ''prove themselves'' by beating up

Arabs. Most large cities have their ethnic enclaves which once upon a

time would have been called ghettoes. And it is no revelation to say

that Scotland, home to 10,000 refugees according to the Scottish Refugee

Council, has seen its share of racial attacks.

Western Europe has long been uncomfortable with those it invited over

its borders or those who claimed the right of residence or citizenship.

France has Arabs; Britain people from Asia and the Caribbean; Germany's

post-war economic revival was powered by guest workers from Turkey and

Yugoslavia; Portugal and Holland also have ethnic populations made up of

formerly subject peoples. Racial tensions have often been the result. In

addition to these, however, there is a new, growing wave of

asylum-seekers and illegal immigrants. Millions from the south have

crossed the Mediterranean, in particular, in an effort to escape from

economic collapse in their homelands.

Five thousand people sought political asylum in Britain in 1988; last

year the figure rose to 30,000; this year it is expected to top 50,000.

In France, where Prime Minister Edith Cresson sought earlier this year

to outbid her opponents on the right by proposing the deportation of

illegal immigrants, there are 3.6 million lawful foreign residents.

Perhaps a million more are ''illegals''.

In Italy, which saw an influx of 24,000 Albanians earlier this year,

there are perhaps one million non-EC immigrants, according to the Reuter

news agency. Germany has five million and dealt with a 60% increase

(bringing the total to 200,000) in asylum seekers last year.

Switzerland, similarly, saw a 50% increase in applications in 1990 --

and accepted only 5% while discussing, perfectly seriously, the

possibility of placing troops at border posts to keep the illegals out.

Meanwhile, the war in Yugoslavia has so far produced an estimated

150,000 refugees.

Racism is the sub-text to any debate on the issue. Over the past year

there have been disturbances all over France. There have been riots in

Brussels and Rome, brawls and racial attacks in almost every large city.

Amid it all, the parties of the far right are flourishing. Jean-Marie

Le Pen, of the French National Front, has had fun deriding the efforts

of other politicians to match his language. First it was Cresson; then

Jacques Chirac complained of immigrant ''dirt and noise''; now Giscard

has stepped in, playing the same tune.

Yet Le Pen is so confident of his power base in the south (a third of

the vote is not unusual) that he intends to stand next March against the

socialist millionaire Bernard Tapie in the race to become president of

the Provence-Alpes-Cote d'Azur region. Tapie, owner of Marseilles

football club, the most succesful in France, is a hero because of the

team's revival. But the local, received wisdom is that he will have to

fight hard to beat the former paratrooper, who bought himself a flat in

conservative Nice a few months ago.

Posters for the National Front leader (''Le Pen Vite!'' is this year's

model) pop up like milestones at roadsides all over the Midi, where most

immigrants arrive. Yet even French socialists will tell you, as though a

statistic were an explanation, that half a million people from the

Mahgreb arrived at Marseilles's Marignane airport last year on tourist

visas. ''Vacances?'' snort these white liberals.

In Italy the Lega Norda, dedicated to an independent republic from the

Alps to Tuscany, is basing its appeal on hatred of the immigrants who

have moved into the south of the country. They have been arriving at

Europe's ''soft underbelly'' not only from Albania but from Turkey,

north Africa, the Balkans and even Pakistan. Margherita Boniver, Italy's

immigration minister, said this summer: ''We are only a few hours from

the impoverished countries of north Africa and we have 5000km of

coastline, so the country is virtually undefendable.''

Meanwhile, the new Germany's old Nazism is reviving, particularly in

the east, where a hard-pressed population is terrified -- and angry --

at the prospect of an influx from Russia and Poland. Buses have been

stoned, deaths have occurred -- and the Government has decided to act.

Germany has posted an extra 200 guards on the borders with Poland --

the gateway favoured by Romanians and Yugoslavs -- and Czechoslovakia in

an attempt to stem the flow of illegals.

According to the UN High Commission for Refugees, there are 20 million

displaced persons around the world. One calculation suggests that by the

year 2000 the Arab countries of the Mediterranean alone will have a

population surplus -- at a time when Western Europe's birth-rates are

falling -- of 100 million. Increasingly, as the European Community

fulfills its promises of prosperity, the people of the Third World are

turning to the First for sanctuary. Increasingly, they are finding the

gate closed.

Estimates of potential immigrants from the old Soviet empire are hard

to come by and vary from 2 million to an awesome 20 million. It is known

that in 1990 400,000 emigrated to Germany, Israel and the United States

and that one million visa applications are being processed. Former

Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze believes that perhaps 1.5

million will eventually leave. But at least 1.75 million Germans live in

the old USSR and all will be allowed to return to Germany over the next

decade.

Recently the European newspaper reported that Soviet ministers had

struck deals with Belgium and Germany whereby skilled guest workers

would be accepted on two-year contracts. The Russians described it as a

''social contract'' with the West and were said to be seeking more such

deals to place six million workers. So far, however, Belgium has

accepted only 500, Germany 15,000.

Nevertheless, short-term labour contracts are seen by many as a way of

solving both the economic problems of the east and south while meeting a

predicted skill shortage -- the result of population decline -- in

Western Europe. Former West German Chancellor Willy Brandt has long

interpreted the immigrant/refugee problem in terms of the economic

imbalance between north and south.

He and others have also called for quotas on immigrants to the EC,

with priority for those from Eastern Europe and north Africa. They are

also demanding a new, enhanced role for the UN High Commission.

But in this, the 40th anniversary year of the signing of the UN

Convention on Refugees, the problem of the ''new hordes'' does not seem

so simple. With what rigour -- or brutality -- would quotas be enforced?

What sanctions would or could be applied by the UN?

The EC has three groups at work on various aspects of the problem. The

Trevi Group, a conclave of ministers which meets in secret, has called

for more rigorous frontier checks, harmonised policies on immigration,

asylum and visas, and computerised tracking of ''undesirables''.

The controversial Ad Hoc Group on Immigration, established in 1986,

has been covering similar ground with much the same personnel. Again,

its talks are secret and British Ministers have used the royal

prerogative to avoid reporting on it to Parliament. Again, however, a

computerised list of undesirables is known to have been agreed in

principle.

The group has stalled on the issue of visas, however, largely because

of British objections to a Euro-visa allowing visitors a three-month

stay in any part of the EC. A proposed ''agreed'' convention has been

postponed.

Meanwhile, the Schengen Group, comprising eight EC countries (Britain

is not a member) has been juggling with the contradictions involved in

removing Europe's internal frontiers while strengthening its external

ones. The group has already called for tighter controls on immigration.

Europe's impending crisis is an historical irony. For a century and a

half the poor and adventurous of the continent made new lives through

emigration. Scots understand that better than most. Now, with virgin

lands hard to come by and the world divided into oases of prosperity

amid deserts of poverty, the process is being reversed. And if history

teaches anything it is that when peoples are on the move no power on

earth can stop them.