Opinion: migration crisis at EU and US borders to intensify in 2023

Migration in the world will intensify this year, so a new round of aggravation of this crisis on the borders of the United States and the European Union is currently observed – as noted by political expert Piotr Petrovsky

“There are several reasons for that. One of them is situational, and it is associated with the removal of COVID restrictions. In 2020, migration flows stopped due to the closure of borders. In 2021, the majority of Western governments demonstrated some shying away from coronavirus restrictions, depending on the epidemiological situation. Moreover, the so-called COVID passports, with vaccination marks, were used in many Western countries. Without them, migrants could not move so freely. Meanwhile, in 2022, almost all countries abandoned those COVID restrictions and abolished COVID passports, thus removing all obstacles for migrants,” Mr. Petrovsky said.

According to the expert, the objective side of migration is that its reason has not been removed. “It deals with the deepening inequality between the golden billion of Western countries and the inhabitants of the rest of the world in connection with the legacy of colonial capitalism. It is based on the so-called unequal exchange, which leads to the impoverishment of developing countries as a result of discriminatory and unfair world trade and financial system, which is sometimes accompanied by military intervention of Western countries,” he added.

Mr. Petrovsky noted, “The subjective reason is that Western countries somehow promote migration, which is due to the demographic crisis that creates difficulties in reproduction of their own population. Accordingly, migrants here act as cheap labour, filling the gaps freed up in Western societies.”

Illegal migration produces much trouble for Washington: billions [of Dollars] are spent on it. Pushed into the background by the energy crisis and aggressive US foreign policy, this problem is approaching. For example, there were 850 thousand illegal border crossings in 2019, and 640 thousand in 2020, but the figure rose to 1 million 700 thousand in 2021, and 2 million 700 thousand in 2022. In 2023, after the removal of all COVID restrictions and the restoration of migration routes, these processes are likely to intensify. After all, no one has cancelled the underlying causes of migration.