The most ‘anti-immigration’ country in Europe has been revealed – and it wants to introduce a Rwanda-style migrant deal similar to the one that has today been thwarted by the UK Supreme Court.
One of Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s key pledges is to “stop the boats” and curb the number of migrants and asylum seekers reaching the shores of Britain.
While many Britons see reducing immigration as a problem the government should tackle, there are a few countries where an even larger share of their population than that in Britain believes this to be a key issue to resolve.
The Democracy Perception Index 2023 survey, carried out by NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen’s Alliance of Democracies group, asked a series of wide-ranging questions to a sample of 53,970 people scattered around 53 countries – around 1,000 people per country.
Among the questions asked by Latana and the Alliance of Democracies between February 7 and March 27 was “Which of the following areas do you want your government to focus on more”. Among the Britons responding to this poll, 22 percent named reducing immigration among their three top choices – a number much lower than the one recorded in Austria, where 34 percent of those surveyed believe their government needs to tackle the issue of migration.
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Earlier this month, it was announced Vienna is seeking to adopt plans to deport asylum seekers to a third country – much like the UK with its Rwanda scheme.
The then Home Secretary Suella Braverman signed a “migration and security agreement” with her Austrian counterpart, Gerhard Karner, in which the two countries agreed to work more closely together on the issue.
But the European Commission has since stated EU asylum law applies only to applications made on the territory of a member state, which would make a Rwanda-style deal impossible to implement for Austria.
While according to the wide-ranging survey Austria appeared to be the most anti-immigration nation in the world, citizens in several other European nations named reducing the number of migrants as one of the most pressing issues for them.
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In Germany, 31 percent of the respondents mentioned reducing immigration as one of the main areas they want Olaf Scholz’s government to focus on.
A high number of respondents in The Netherlands, 30 percent, also mentioned immigration, while 29 percent spoke about this issue in Belgium.
The non-European nation with the highest percentage when it comes to this answer was Chile, with 26 percent.
Chile is the country where, according to this survey, the highest number of people around the globe consider migration one of the biggest world challenges, with 28 percent mentioning this problem when asked: “In your opinion, which of the following do you think are the world’s top three biggest challenges right now?”
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This nation was followed by Austria, where 27 percent of the responders said to see migration as one of the world’s top challenges.
Among the UK respondents, 16 percent said to see migration as one of the main challenges for the world, with more people answering war and violent conflicts as well as poverty and hunger as the main concerns.
In its attempt to tackle the number of migrants reaching the UK, the British government unveiled a £140m plan that would deport people seeking asylum to Rwanda.
While the government saw this as a key deterrent for those thinking of travelling to Britain, five judges at the supreme court unanimously upheld on Wednesday an appeal court ruling that found there was a real risk of deported refugees having their claims wrongly determined in Rwanda and being as a result returned to their country of origin to face persecution.
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