Statements by the Council and Commission on the latest tragedies in the Mediterranean and EU migration and asylum policies (Report of the extraordinary European Council (23 April 2015) during the EP plenary session in Strasbourg. Sytatements by Donald TUSK, President of the European Council and Jean-Claude JUNCKER, President of the EC

statement

Strasbourg

plenary session

migration and refugees in Europe (T)

JUNCKER, Jean-Claude (LU)

death of migrants in the Mediterranean Sea (T)

TUSK, Donald (PL)

political asylum

special meeting of the European Council 23 April 2015 (T)

The latest tragedies in the Mediterranean and EU migration and asylum policies (Report of the extraordinary European Council (23 April 2015): extracts from the Council and Commission statements

Interior, plenary, before the debate starts, EC President Jean-Claude Juncker, receiving the speech text, giving hand kiss in return, (1 shot), walking over to EC Vice-President Timmermans, giving kiss on the forefront, (1 shot)

SOUNDBITE (English), Donald TUSK, President of the European Council, "We will confront the smugglers and traffickers. The people smugglers in North Africa and elsewhere are cynical, ruthless and often violent. They take the live saving of the desperate and leave them to drown in the sea, worse they deliberate place vessels in dangerous situations. Leaders have asked the High Preventative to take actions, including a possible CSDP operation to identify, capture and destroy the smugglers vessels before they are used."

SOUNDBITE (English), Donald TUSK, President of the European Council, "The best way to protect people from drowning is to ensure that they do not get on the boat in the first place. Almost none of the migrants are Libyans, therefore we will help the countries around Libya, Tunisia, Egypt, Sudan, Mali, and Niger among others to monitor and to control the land borders and travel routes."

SOUNDBITE (English), Donald TUSK, President of the European Council, "The final element was the need to do more on refugee protection. We all know that this is a difficult and sensitive debate, still we made some progress. This includes the full and effective implementation of the Common European Asylum system to ensure the same standards in all member states and increase of emergency aid to front member states and the deployment of support teams to help process asylum claims."

SOUNDBITE (French), Jean-Claude JUNCKER, President of the EC, "Triton funding is going to be beefed up to a 120 Million Euros, that is precisely the extend of the Mare Nostrum budget, in other words we are catching up, we are making up for the temporary cut which resulted to the end of Mare Nostrum and has cost human lives." (Applause)

SOUNDBITE (French), Jean-Claude JUNCKER, President of the EC, "It is one thing to tackle the symptoms of the crisis as President Tusk has said, everything possible must be done to stop unfortunate people taking these awful boats, we have to be able to save Human lives in the places from where they come to stop them, stop the same Human lives ending on the high seas and that means an increase in developing aid, it is essential."

SOUNDBITE (French), Jean-Claude JUNCKER, President of the EC, "We have to be sure that we deal with the tricky questions of legal migration. We have to leave the door partly open, if we don't open the door to legal migration then the unfortunate people of the world will be climbing in through our windows."