ＥＵ、入域規制強化を協議　イスラム過激派対策で

【ＡＦＰ＝時事】欧州首脳は10日、各国でイスラム過激派の攻撃が相次いでいることを受けて、欧州連合（EU）圏への入域規制の厳格化について協議し、共同歩調を取る方針を表明した。（写真は資料写真）
　フランスとオーストリアで最近発生した複数の事件を受けて、今回の首脳会議を呼び掛けたフランスのエマニュエル・マクロン大統領は、「迅速で協調的な」対応を求めるとともに、悪意ある動機で入域を求める人々によって、欧州の保護規定が「悪用」されていると批判。
　人身売買業者などの犯罪組織や、「戦争状態ではない」国々から来た人々による「保護権の悪用」がＥＵ全加盟国でみられると指摘した。
　欧州首脳は１０日、出入国審査のないシェンゲン圏に属する国家間のビザ（査証）不要の移動を維持することを確認した上で、域外との境界の規制強化について協議した。
　ドイツのアンゲラ・メルケル首相は、「（シェンゲン圏を）出入りする人々について知ることは、われわれにとって緊急かつ重要」として規制強化に賛同した。【翻訳編集ＡＦＰＢＢＮｅｗｓ】
〔ＡＦＰ＝時事〕（2020/11/11-15:50）

European leaders on Tuesday mooted tightening the EU's external borders, as they vowed joint action following a spate of attacks on home soil blamed on Islamist radicals.
President Emmanuel Macron, who called a summit after deadly recent acts of terror in France and Austria, called for a rapid and coordinated response and denounced what he described as the misuse of Europe's asylum provisions by people seeking entry for sinister reasons.
In all of our countries we are witnessing a misuse of the right to asylum by traffickers, criminal gangs, or people from countries which are not at war, the French leader told journalists after the video conference.
The meeting was called after four people were killed in a shooting rampage by a dual Austrian-Macedonian national in the heart of Vienna last week.
A Chechen radical Islamist with asylum status beheaded a history teacher outside Paris last month, and a Tunisian who came to France on a migrant boat then killed three people at a church in Nice.
The crimes prompted a debate about entry control.
And as European leaders vowed Tuesday to protect the Schengen zone of visa-free travel between member countries, they also talked about strengthening the common zone's borders with the outside.
You can only can preserve it (Schengen) if we urgently, urgently focus on the external borders, said Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte.
The Netherlands, he said, supported strengthening Frontex -- the agency tasked with helping EU countries and the Schengen members manage their external borders.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel, for her part, agreed it was urgent and crucial for us to know who enters and who leaves the Schengen area.
- 'Time bombs' -
Meeting host Macron called for better data exchanges between EU countries because any security gap on the external border or inside member states is a security risk for all the member states.
Last week, he announced a doubling of the number of French border guards, and called for a deep revision in the Schengen area rules.
Also present at Tuesday's meeting were Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz, European Council chief Charles Michel and EU Commission head Ursula von der Leyen, who also underscored the protection of external borders as a priority.
Kurz said the danger of an attack is with us permanently.
We have among us thousands of foreign terrorist combatants who survived combat in Syria and Iraq for the Islamic State (group) and returned, he said.
These are time bombs, added Kurz. We need to adopt a more solid approach to the threat weighing on Europe.
Stressing there was no conflict between Islam and Christianity, Merkel said there was, however, a strong need for a model of democratic society to combat terrorist and undemocratic behaviour in Europe.
Key to the battle was a determined fight against terrorist propaganda and hate speech online, said Macron.
French teacher Samuel Paty's beheading last month was inspired by a virulent social media campaign against him by parents after he had shown cartoons of the Prophet Mohamed to pupils in a lesson on free speech.
The internet is a space of freedom, our social networks too, but this freedom exists only if there is security and if it is not the refuge of those who flout our values or seek to indoctrinate with deadly ideologies, said the French president.
He is pushing for the adoption in the coming weeks of EU regulations forcing media and websites to speedily remove terrorist propaganda that appears on their platforms.
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