African securityEU planning military attacks on trafficking networks in Libya to stop migrant boats

The European Union (EU) is planning military attacks on trafficking networks in Libya to try and stop the influx of migrants across the Mediterranean. Today (Monday) several EU member states will try to secure a UN mandate for armed action by NATO in Libya’s territorial waters.

A senior EU official in Brussels said Britain is drafting the UN Security Council resolution to authorize the mission in Libya’s territorial waters. The naval force would be under Italian command and include naval units from ten EU countries, among them Britain, France, Spain, and Italy. NATO may eventually become involved in the anti-trafficking operations, but there are no current plans for such involvement.

Today, Federica Mogherini, the EU’s chief foreign and security policy coordinator, will be briefing the UN Security Council on the plans for a “chapter seven” resolution authorizing the use of force. Knowledgeable sources told the Guardian that the British draft calls for the “use of all means to destroy the business model of the traffickers.”

Military experts say such action would require EU vessels to operate in Libyan territorial waters, accompanied by helicopter gunships to “neutralize” identified traffickers’ ships used to send tens of thousands of migrants from sub-Saharan Africa and the Middle East on the perilous voyage from the Libyan coast to southern Italy.

A British Ministry of Defense (MoD) spokesperson said: “Working closely with Italy and EU partners, HMS Bulwark and three Royal Naval Merlin Helicopters are providing wide ranging search and rescue capabilities in the Mediterranean, already rescuing over 100 people. The U.K. is now considering how best to support the proposed EU mission to counter the smuggling networks.”

The Guardian notes that Libyan militias, jihadi groups, and Islamic State affiliates who are in cahoots with the trafficking networks have deployed heavy artillery and anti-aircraft batteries close to the coast. Attacks on EU vessels and aircraft could trigger an escalation and force NATO to get involved.

EU sources say that they were told by Chinese diplomats that China would veto a Security Council resolution authorizing military action against Libyan traffickers, and that Russia, despite current tensions with the West over Ukraine, can be persuaded not to use its veto power against the resolution.

Libya’s ambassador to the UN, Ibrahim Dabbashi, told the AP that he had not been consulted on the plans and opposed them.

So far, six EU states have committed to contribute forces to the naval operation, with several more expected to offer participation. All twenty-eight member states have already expressed support for the proposed campaign.

In parallel to the preparation for military action, on Wednesday the European Commission (EC), the governing body of the EU, will unveil a new European “migration agenda.” The new policy calls for creating new and binding rules establishing a quota system of sharing refugees among the EU twenty-eight member states.

The proposal is promoted by Germany but it has already been rejected by Britain and east European countries.

“The EU needs a permanent system for sharing the responsibility for large numbers of refugees and asylum seekers among member states,” says the commission proposal obtained by the Guardian. By the end of the year Brussels is to table new legislation “for a mandatory and automatically-triggered relocation system to distribute those in clear need of international protection within the EU when a mass influx emerges.”

Currently, Germany and Sweden between them take nearly half of asylum-seekers in the EU, and Berlin says that the number this year could almost double to around 400,000 in Germany alone, two-thirds of the total number in the EU last year.

“Some member states have already made a major contribution to [refugee] resettlement efforts. But others offer nothing,” the commission paper complains. The document also insists that Europe has to open up legal avenues for migrants to enter the union safely, an idea which is strongly opposed by Theresa May, Britain’s home secretary.

“Such vulnerable people cannot be left to resort to the criminal networks of smugglers and traffickers. There must be safe and legal ways for them to reach the EU,” the commission document says.

The proposal now circulating in Brussels proposes to invoke “emergency mechanisms” by the end of the month making it mandatory for the twenty-eight member states to share the numbers of “persons in clear need of international protection” and “to ensure a fair and balanced participation of all member states to this common effort. This step will be the precursor of a lasting solution.”

The new blueprint, to be presented by commissioner Dimitris Avramopoulos on Wednesday, includes a distribution “key” system based on various criteria from national wealth levels to unemployment rates to determine what proportion of refugees each of the twenty-eight member states should each admit.