Updated: France launches EU policy to stem illegal immigration

(Adds Maltese reaction)

EU ministers today broadly backed French proposals for a tougher common policy to stem illegal immigration, despite some differences and concerns about accusations of xenophobia from outside the bloc.

In an initial reaction, the Maltese Ministry of Justice and Home Affairs said that Malta considered the proposals very favourably and viewed them as a step in the right direction. However Malta would like to see more on burden sharing between all EU member states not only because Malta, being such a small state, could not be expected to shoulder all the burden associated with an influx of migrants. but also in view of the need for intra-European integration for these people, the spokesman said.

Spain said it was satisfied with changes to the plan France hopes to see adopted by leaders of the 27 European Union states in October, having previously expressed concerns about proposals to ban mass legalisations of illegal immigrants.

"I am satisfied with the changes, it is important to have a common policy on immigration," Spanish Interior Minister Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba told reporters as he and his EU counterparts met in Cannes on the French Riviera to discuss the French plan.

France has made harmonising the bloc's immigration policy a priority of its six-month EU stewardship that began this month. Under its plan, EU states would pledge to boost the fight against illegal migration and expel more illegal migrants, and confirm commitments for a common asylum policy by 2010.

Spain had insisted its 2005 "regularisation" of 700,000 illegal immigrants could not be ruled against the law.

Spanish media reported that Spain and France had reached an agreement on changes to the text during a visit by French Immigration Minister Brice Hortefeux to Madrid on Thursday.

"We have managed to have accepted certain elements of our policy on immigration," Rubalcaba said, without elaborating.

Spain has been concerned about the angry reaction of South American countries, whose leaders have slammed new EU rules that allow authorities to detain illegal immigrants for up to 18 months and ban them from re-entry for up to five years.

Diplomats said some states with more liberal views on migrant workers, like Sweden, wanted the French text broadened to encourage migration to fill whatever skill shortages exist, rather than on the current basis of "highly qualified" workers.

EU officials argue the bloc must get tougher on illegal immigration to convince voters to be more accepting of legal immigrants needed to make up for the bloc's aging population.

France's Hortefeux has said concerns about immigration were one reason Irish voters have rejected the EU reform treaty.

"I think Ireland, given the fact that we, like other European countries, have issues in relation to asylum, we are favourably disposed to the proposals that are on the table," Irish Justice Minister Dermot Ahern told reporters in Cannes.

German Interior Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble said Berlin agreed with the French proposal. "I don't see a wall around Europe," he said. "We are fighting illegal immigration and we manage legal immigration."

EU Justice Commissioner Jacques Barrot said it was necessary to bring order to migration. "It is necessary to have a Europe that is of course open, but a Europe with rules of the game, a Europe which remains a land of asylum, but which does that in a harmonised manner, generous but also well organised," he said.

Greek Interior Minister Prokopis Pavlopoulos said the aim was not to create a "fortress" Europe, but one with a coherent policy. "With this pact we will arrive at a policy which meets European standards of democracy and civilisation," he said.

The European Commission estimates there are up to 8 million illegal migrants in the bloc. More than 200,000 were arrested in the first half of 2007, and fewer than 90,000 were expelled.