A strengthening of anti-immigrant political movements in the European elections will lead to more migrant chaos elsewhere in the world, including Africa, a UN refugee agency official warned today.

“The way Europe treats its refugees is something that can be seen elsewhere. Europe has a major role as a role model” said UNHCR special envoy for the situation in the central and western Mediterranean, Vincent Costel, during a press briefing in Geneva.

With far-right parties doing well in the polls for the European elections, Costel believes that a rise in anti-immigration political movements will have global consequences.

“We cannot expect these African countries that have maintained a tradition of asylum for decades to continue to maintain this tradition if Europe treats the refugee populations on its soil differently“, he said. “If we have a breakdown of protection values ​​for refugees in Europe, we will see the same trend elsewhere.”

As he pointed out, this will lead to “less well managed (migratory) movements, in much more movements, in all directions, not just to Europe” and therefore “a good business quite profitable for traffickers“.

Costel therefore asks “to maintain the capital of sympathy that also exists in Europe for a better managed immigration and also for the presence of refugees on European soil”.

“When millions of Ukrainians came to Europe, this was not such a big problem to deal with,” he stressed, acknowledging that “there is always more compassion for the refugees next door than for those who come from further away or who look different“.

As he pointed out, we need to explain that refugees do not come to Europe “by chance” but because they are fleeing the conflicts that sometimes rage close to the European continent, such as in Sudan, which has been plagued by a “brutal conflict” since April 2023. So we have to prepare, without panic because the numbers are completely manageable. But we have to try to explain to Europe why Sudanese refugees are arriving.”

The HCR official said there is “no easy solution” to the migration flows. He explained that Europe should work with neighboring countries but warned that “we don’t just need a maritime border control plan because that doesn’t solve all the problems”.

In a report released today, HCR also calls for an increase in humanitarian protection services along the main routes taken by refugees and migrants.