What determines whether a Member State’s decision on migration is welcomed or rejected by Brussels?
Depending on the subjective preferences of the key decision-makers, the EU disregards its own rules with no hesitation when it comes to migration-related measures – a conclusion one can draw from the fact how differently or even biased Brussels sees the anti-migration measures introduced by Member States.
What makes this post particularly timely is Poland’s recent border protection measures, which seem to be approved by the EU, while the introduction of very similar measures in other member states was condemned by the same top EU bodies a few years ago. As the issue has a strong political message, it is worth taking the time to examine the situation.
Historical flashback
When speaking about anomalies in the European Commission’s decisions in the area of migration, it is worth starting with the issue of border walls and fences in general. Building walls is considered the most criticised form of border protection worldwide, despite the fact that even super-democratic powers such as the United States use such constructions. While opponents label border walls and fences as anti-human and anti-democratic, these sort of constructions are used worlwide as effective tools against illegal migration.
Walls and fences have been used on EU borders for decades in the fight against illegal migration, not to mention walls from the ancient Roman times which were built not only to mark the borders of the empire but also to keep the enemies of Rome away from the provinces.
When we touch the topic of European border protection it is a must to mention Spanish efforts in this area as Spain has been operating one of the longest-established border protection systems in Europe on its borders with Morocco. The 6-metre high and 8.4 km long Ceuta border fence has presumably prevented millions of African migrants from illegally entering the EU since its construction in 1993.
Border management during the migration crisis in 2015
During the EU’s largest ever migration crisis in 2015, some countries, including Hungary, in order to ensure the safety of their citizens and stop the further influx of illegal migrants, built border barriers, in accordance with national law. The Hungarian government stated they took the initiative in building a fence to stop migrants entering the country just because the EU was too slow to act. Hungary’s decision sparked loud criticism in Brussels, despite the fact that the 4-m high concertina wire fence on Hungary’s southern border proved to be very effective: once the barrier was constructed, attempted border entries sharply fell.
Hungary has paid a high price for its sovereign decision to build a fence on its borders since it not only faced a series of condemnatory statements by top EU officials but was also widely criticised by some Member States. In addition, tensions increased even higher as the European Commission rejected Hungarian demands to co-finance its border barrier.
As a related issue, in 2015 Hungary asked the Court of Justice of the European Union to annul the EU decision to relocate migrants but its claim was dismissed. Despite the discriminative statements and decisions of the Commission, Hungary’s strong anti-migration stance government has remained steadfast ever since, moreover, the slogan of ’Zero migration’ has remained one of the Hungarian government’s key campaign messages until today.
In 2015 and 2016, Austria also constructed border barriers and migration management facilities on its border with Slovenia and Italy, as a respose to the mass migration crisis. Interestingly, for its border management, Austria was not condemned by Brussels, despite the fact that the mentioned border barriers were placed on internal EU borders.
Changing times, new priorities
A remark should be made at this point, considering that the governments of Hungary and Austria are not anymore alone in the EU in insisting that migration must be curbed if Europe is to preserve its culture, traditions and, the higly-valued European prosperity – all the things that make Europe unique and so prescious. Parties with the largest support in Western European countries such as France, Germany and the Netherlands argue that curbing migration is not only a necessary but a crucial step: unless Europe takes this step, it would soon lose control over demographic and other major processes in its societies.
Recent efforts to curb migration on the North-East of Europe
The Polish government has been developing a new border protection system for a couple of years to prevent illegal migrants from the Middle East, Africa and South Asia, including Pakistan from entering the country from North-East. According to NATO reports, this unusual mass migration on the eastern border of the EU / NATO is, in fact a joint hybrid attack by Moscow, with migrants directed by the Belarusian authorities to the Polish border to undermine the EU’s authority and migration policy.
After that Belarusian leader Aliaksandr Lukashenka on 10 April agreed with his Pakistani counterpart that Belarus is ready to accept up to 150,000 Pakistani workers ’to help address the country’s deepening labor shortage’, Poland reported two attacks on Polish border guards by migrants, with one incident involving a uniformed Belarusian officer throwing rocks at a Polish patrol. As a result of these two events, the Polish authorities said that the Polish-Belarusian border will, for sure, remain closed.
Warsaw has for some time combined its efforts to combat the above mentioned so-called orchestrated or artificial migration along its north-eastern borders with its Eastern Shield project, a largely military initiative to build a complex border protection system including buffer zones and border fences.
As part of this programme, Poland is ready to ease rules on the use of weapons by border guards, in addition, is considering partial reintroduction of entry bans and suspension of asylum applications. The €2.2 billion fortification project features advanced surveillance systems, anti-tank fortifications, potential minefields and physical barriers and satellite monitoring to counter hybrid warfare. According to the plan, Poland’s new defence line will be completed by 2028.
And, surprise surprise: Poland is not facing any criticism from Brussels, on the contrary, Donald Tusk’s government enjoys all the support for the Eastern Shield programme on behalf of the EU’s top officials: on 11 December, 2024, the European Commission has given political approval to Poland’s plan to introduce new border protection measures, in response to the migration flows that Russia and Belarus have weaponised against the EU’s eastern border.
’The Commission is clarifying the exceptional situations where the member states can take also exceptional measures,’ said Henna Virkkunen, the Commission’s executive vice-president for tech sovereignty, security and democracy when commenting the Commission’s new guidelines.
Policy of double standard?
Before we start claiming too loudly that the situation constitutes a ’double standard’, it is important to make two remarks. Based on them, you can judge the situation yourself.
1) The Hungarian measures in 2015 and the Polish measures in 2025 are ’inconsistent’ with exactly the same EU legislation, while both cases are legally based at national level and both countries had and have the right to defend themselves.
2) While the Hungarians built a border fence as a response to the mass migration crisis, the recent Polish border measures have largely been triggered by the Russia-Ukraine war where the orchestrated migration at Poland’s borders is just a part of this wider context.
Taking all things into consideration, both situations can undoubtably be called ’exceptional’ (borrowing Henna Virkkunen’s phrase).
Paradoxically, the European Commission, in its new guidelines, is justifying the Polish draft under the same Treaty articles that Hungary had also referred to in its infringement procedure over the issue of the so-called resettlement quotas. What makes a difference, that Hungary’s demand was rejected. In its official statement of 11 December 2024 regarding Poland’s case, the Commission refers to ’countering hybrid threats from the weaponisation of migration and strengthening security at the EU’s external borders’. If one follows the news, easily admits that the current Polish border situation is the same as it was in Hungary ten years ago: mass migration flows, illegal entries, aggression, attacks, etc.
Any lessons learned?
We can conclude that Brussels sometimes distinguishes between Member States when assessing the support for national governments in the area of migration and border security. Despite the fact that security falls under national jurisdiction, nevertheless Brussels wants to have a say in it. In other words, this is called interfering in national competencies.
As for the different judgement of the Hungarian and the Polish measures by the Commission described above, it should be emphasised that the recent Polish efforts to strengthen EU borders are, indeed, something that must be welcomed and supported, at the same time it should be added that, the same should have been done in the case of Hungary as well. However, it is never too late to recognise and correct the mistakes. The EU, for sure, cannot continue with its hypocritical policy of double standards.
It should also be noted that had the Commission been wiser in 2015, it might have already implemented European defence development plans such as ReArm Europe / Readiness 2030 by now. Instead, the truth is that the bloc has wasted an entire decade by not taking the migration crisis of 2015 as a wake-up call and by failing to build its own defence architecture that could provide an adequate response to the various external threats to the EU, such as migration surges – let it be an ordinary phenomenon or an orchestrated hybrid attack – and, military conflicts.
But, the focus in Brussels, wrongly, has been placed on the introduction of a joint resettlement scheme and asylum system which tends to benefit the illegal migrants. The Commission has been lost somewhere between the ’immigration quotas’, ’infringement procedures’ and the ’equal burden-sharing’, failing to recognise the new challenges, while sinking deeper and deeper into the policy of double standards.
Will any top Eurocrat in Brussels admit this one day?
