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EU seeks talks with Taliban on deporting failed Afghan asylum-seekers
Planned meeting
EU migration chief Magnus Brunner announced a forthcoming meeting in Brussels with Taliban officials to discuss the return of failed asylum-seekers to Afghanistan.
EU migration chief Magnus Brunner announced a forthcoming meeting in Brussels with Taliban officials to discuss the return of failed asylum-seekers to Afghanistan.
Repatriation Efforts
Approximately 20 of the EU’s 27 member states have shown interest in repatriating failed Afghan asylum-seekers, highlighting a significant shift in migration policy amidst heightened public demand.
Approximately 20 of the EU’s 27 member states have shown interest in repatriating failed Afghan asylum-seekers, highlighting a significant shift in migration policy amidst heightened public demand.
Brunner’s Defence
“It’s no option not to talk to these people in order to improve the situation,” stated Magnus Brunner, the EU’s commissioner for migration.
“It’s no option not to talk to these people in order to improve the situation,” stated Magnus Brunner, the EU’s commissioner for migration.
No option but to talk to Taliban about migrant returns, EU’s migration commissoner says
Published on
Europe has no other option than to talk to the Taliban government about returning failed asylum-seekers to Afghanistan, the EU’s migration chief said on Thursday, defending a planned meeting in Brussels that critics say would renege on the bloc’s values.
The European Commission has invited Taliban officials for discussions under a push to crack down on irregular migration and boost deportations, despite it not formally recognising the Taliban administration.
“It’s no option not to talk to these people in order to improve the situation,” Magnus Brunner, the EU’s commissioner for migration, told journalists.
Taliban officials were yet to be granted visas to visit Belgium and a date has not been set for the meeting but it has already caused an uproar in Brussels.
European governments shut their embassies in Kabul when the Taliban authorities returned to power in 2021 and imposed their strict interpretation of Islamic law.
Women must be almost entirely covered when they leave home and are banned from a host of public places, including parks and gyms, while girls’ education stops at age 12.
Rights groups have questioned the legality and ethics of returning migrants to a country that is in the midst of a severe humanitarian crisis, with millions facing hunger and economic hardship, according to the United Nations.
But Brunner said that talks were not tantamount to recognising the “Taliban regime” and that it was in Europe’s best interest to press ahead with them, citing interest from many member states.
“It is important to talk to them at least to improve the situation for Europeans, but also for asylum applicants, for asylum-seekers,” Brunner said.
The Belgian government told the AFP news agency the commission had given it the names of the Taliban officials expected to be part of the delegation, allowing for security services to start checks, but it was yet to receive any visa applications from them.
European governments have sought a tougher stance on migration as public opinion has hardened, fuelling far-right electoral gains across the continent.
With migrant arrivals down, the focus in Brussels has turned to improving the repatriation system.
EU countries received about a million asylum applications filed by Afghans between 2013-2024, according to the bloc’s data agency. About half as many were approved over the period.
Around 20 of the EU’s 27 member states expressed interest in returning some migrants without a right to stay, particularly those with criminal convictions, to Afghanistan in a letter last year.
Some countries have pushed ahead, with Germany deporting more than 100 Afghans with criminal convictions since 2024.
Additional sources • AFP
October 12, 2024
6:18 am
‘Cheer up, you caught the bad guy,’ says killer Virginia McCullough as she is arrested for murdering her parents
A woman who murdered her parents “in cold blood” before hiding them in makeshift tombs for four years told officers to “cheer up, you caught the bad guy” as she was arrested in her home.
Virginia McCullough, 36, poisoned her father John McCullough, 70, with prescription medication and fatally stabbed her mother Lois McCullough, 71, shortly afterwards in 2019.
She ran up large debts on credit cards in her parents’ names and after their deaths, she continued to spend their pensions until she was finally caught in 2023.
In body-worn video footage released by police, a handcuffed – and eerily calm – McCullough told officers: “I did know that this would kind of come eventually.
“It’s proper that I serve my punishment.”
She said she had slipped something into her father’s drink then put his body under a bed on the ground floor, and put her mother’s body in an upstairs wardrobe.
McCullough, having been arrested on suspicion of double murder, told an officer: “Cheer up, at least you’ve caught the bad guy.”
She added: “I know I don’t seem 100% evil.”
At the police station, she told officers where a kitchen knife was, which she described as a “murder weapon”, and a hammer which she said “will still have blood on it”.
McCullough, of Pump Hill, Chelmsford, Essex, was sentenced to life imprisonment on Friday with a minimum term of 36 years at Chelmsford Crown Court, after she admitted to their murders between 17 and 20 June 2019 at an earlier hearing at the same court.
Chelmsford Crown Court heard how she hid their bodies in makeshift tombs at the family home in Great Baddow in Essex, then told persistent lies to cover her tracks.
The court heard she cancelled family arrangements and frequently told doctors and relatives her parents were unwell, on holiday or away on lengthy trips.
But concerns over Mr and Mrs McCullough’s welfare were raised in September 2023 by a GP at their registered practice, and Essex County Council’s safeguarding team referred these to police.
The GP had not seen the couple for some time and said Mr McCullough had failed to collect medication and attend scheduled appointments. It was found McCullough had frequently cancelled appointments, using a range of excuses to explain her father’s absence.
Police said a missing persons investigation was initially launched and McCullough lied to officers, claiming her parents were travelling and would be returning in October.
It became a murder investigation, and when officers forced entry to the house in Pump Hill on September 15 2023, McCullough confessed that her parents’ bodies were in the house and that she had killed them.
Nicola Rice, a specialist prosecutor for the Crown Prosecution Service, said: “McCullough callously and viciously killed both of her parents before concealing their bodies in makeshift tombs within their home address.
“She spent the next four years manipulating and lying to family members, medical staff, financial institutions, and the police, spending her parents’ money and accruing large debts in their name.”
She added: “This was a truly disturbing case, which has left behind it a trail of devastation, and I can only hope that the sentence passed today will help those who loved and cared for Lois and John begin to heal.”
To downplay the genocide, the israelis claim there’s only 20,000 people left in north Gaza, says
@MahaGaza
: the real number exceeds 400,000
Man of the right wing Nigel Farage taking more second jobs and freebie helicopter rides
Gosh he’ll soon be a true blue Tory at this rate
Or far far worse
The cost-of-living crisis is far from over, yet the government’s 50% increase to the bus fare cap is a political choice, adding hundreds to annual costs.
To address hardship & the climate crisis, the government must keep the £2 cap & make public transport accessible for all.
G20 waters down support for Ukraine amid pressure for peace talks
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November 23, 2024
8:25 am
Defense alliance NATO chief Mark Rutte has met US President-elect Donald Trump to discuss global security issues, according to a NATO spokesperson.
The meeting took place in Palm Beach, Florida.
During his first term as US president, 2017-2020, Trump pushed for European NATO countries to spend more on defense and described the alliance’s cost-sharing as unfair to the US.
Rutte took over as NATO chief from Norwegian Jens Stoltenberg in November.
Before taking office in January, Trump has nominated Pete Hegseth for the post of defense secretary, which has raised eyebrows among many allies.
Hegseth, 44, has served as an infantry captain in Iraq and Afghanistan, but has no senior military or government officer experience.
November 23, 2024
8:25 am
November 23, 2024
8:17 am
Multiple missiles were fired in an airstrike towards a densely populated part of Lebanon’s capital early on Saturday.
The huge airstrike targeted Beirut’s Basta neighbourhood, and no prior warnings were given by the Israeli military. The largely residential area was struck last month.
At least one violent explosion was heard across the city, Reuters witnesses said, and plumes of smoke could be seen. Scenes of massive destruction at the site were shared online, including a massive crater in the ground.
“Beirut, the capital, woke up to a horrific massacre, as the Israeli enemy’s air force completely destroyed an eight-story residential building with five missiles on Al-Mamoun Street in Basta,” the state-run National News Agency reported.
The health ministry put the initial death toll at four, with 23 wounded. The number is expected to climb in the coming hours as search and rescue efforts continue.
It came after a long day of Israeli airstrikes on Beirut’s southern suburbs, which have been non-stop since last week.
The cross-border fighting between Israel and the Iran-backed Hezbollah militant group escalated into a full-blown war in mid-September.
Israel has bombed southern Lebanon, Beirut’s southern suburbs and the eastern Beqaa region, and has sent ground troops across the border. Hezbollah has continued to fire rockets deeper into Israel.
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