21.01.2025
Fortress Europe
with Gabriella E. Sánchez, Klaas van Dijken & Wies Maas
Pushbacks are turning the Mediterranean into a mass grave. Invasive surveillance technologies are being deployed against people on the move across the Polish, Romanian or Croatian borders. And unprecedented footage documents the EU’s continuous involvement in racially motivated anti-migrant operations in North Africa. What is happening at Europe’s borders?
As fascist sentiments are on the rise, leaders across the continent embrace formerly taboo approaches to migration, advocating for deportation centres and border externalisation agreements while safe and legal routes to Europe diminish – leaving more and more space for smuggling and human trafficking. The EU’s migration policies don’t work, yet rules continue to harden.
On Tuesday 21 January we welcomed three experts on migration: socio-cultural anthropologist Gabriella E. Sánchez – acclaimed global expert on border control; Wies Maas – International Programme Coordinator at the Dutch Council for Refugees with 15 years of experience in migration and refugee rights; and investigative journalist Klaas van Dijken – Director of Lighthouse Reports. They discussed how Europe is closing its borders and at what cost, including insights from van Dijken’s latest investigation ‘Desert Dumps‘ which unveils how Europe supports and finances clandestine operations in North African countries where refugees, migrant workers and asylum seekers are being abandoned in the desert to prevent them from entering the EU.
The conversation was moderated by Nuria Ribas Costa.
Participants
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Gabriella E. Sánchez
Gabriella E. Sánchez is research fellow at Georgetown University. A former law enforcement officer, Gabriella has examined the criminalization of the facilitation of irregular migration, and the impact the narratives surrounding migrant smuggling as organized crime have had on border enforcement and externalization practices worldwide. She has held academic posts at several international universities and institutions, including the Migration Policy Centre of the European University Institute and the Danish Institute for International Studies (DIIS). She lives on the US-Mexico border.
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Klaas van Dijken
Klaas van Dijken is co-founder and director of Lighthouse Reports. As investigative journalist and editor, his works focuses on human rights violations at Europe’s borders and the involvement of governments and state-funded agencies. Before Lighthouse, Klaas worked as a conflict reporter and investigative journalist in Eastern and Central Africa and Afghanistan. His work has been published worldwide in print, online and tv.
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Wies Maas
Wies Maas is the International Programme Coordinator at the Dutch Council for Refugees. With 15 years of experience in migration and refugee rights, she has led UN dialogues and national campaigns. Her career spans roles at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, IOM, and The Hague Process on Refugees and Migration (THP).
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Nuria Ribas Costa
Nuria Ribas Costa is a Spanish Journalist and Jurist based between Rotterdam and Ibiza, her homeland. Formerly at OMA, she currently works as an independent researcher and policy analyst in the fields of urbanism and culture. She is part of urbanism agency Humankind, research group Vigla, the Center for Music Ecosystems and De Dépendance. She is interested in the relationships rural-urban, the politics of space and land and intersectionality in urbanism.