Attack in France Highlights Asylum Malfunctions
By Nayla Rush on June 11, 2023
A 31-year-old Syrian refugee last week staged a knife attack at a playground in a public park in the town of Annecy in southeastern France that left six severely injured, including four preschool children, aged 22 to 36 months.
The Syrian refugee is in custody and the investigation is ongoing, but the attack is raising questions about the migratory journey of this refugee and is stirring a debate around France’s, and Europe’s, immigration policies, including the need to review the existing asylum system and revisit the 1951 Refugee Convention that has become obsolete, according to many. The United States needs to have the same debate.
Eric Ciotti, President of the right-wing pollical party “Les Republicains” founded by former French President Nicolas Sarkozy, shared his outrage in the French media following this attack (all translations from French to English in this post are mine):
Faced with such terrible acts, a question arises quickly: did we do everything we could to prevent this? For years and years now…I’m referring to a collective responsibility here. Beyond this affair, there is a migratory chaos that is disrupting Europe, that is hitting France with an immigration that has gone totally unchecked. An immigration that is strongly linked to insecurity and rising violence!
He also pointed to the “catastrophic management of asylum in Europe.”
https://cis.org/Rush/Attack-France-Highlights-Asylum-Malfunctions