Portugal’s Secretary of State for European Affairs, Bruno Macaes, yesterday said he was hopeful that EU member states could find ways of making burden-sharing work without it being legally binding.

If the European Commission took the initiative and if pressure was put on member states to join, more results could be achieved, Mr Macaes told the House Foreign Affairs Committee last night.

His statement provoked an immediate reaction from committee chairman Luciano Busuttil and Opposition foreign affairs spokesman Tonio Fenech.

Dr Busuttil pointed out that no concrete results had been achieved under the voluntary burden-sharing agreement, with the USA taking in more migrants that all the EU member states put together.

Migration, he pointed out, was a European, not a regional, issue.

Mr Fenech agreed with Dr Busuttil about the failure of voluntary burden sharing. He proposed that human resources used in Sudanese waters [in the anti-piracy mission] could be better utilised in the Mediterranean as part of the operation of EU border agency Frontex.

Mr Macaes said Portugal supported Malta’s plans to develop a liaison office between the EU and Arab states.

On the situation in Libya, he expressed hope that the UN representative would successfully broker a deal to establish a unity government even if it may not represent all factions in the country. Both Dr Busuttil and Mr Fenech emphasised that under current circumstances, the issue could not be solved through military intervention.

Mr Fenech said many EU states failed to appreciate the size of the Libyan problem. The terrorism taking place there could be a time bomb close to European shores.

It was important to secure stability in Libya and any peacekeeping force in the country must be Arab led, he said.