Clifford Hill looks at the migrant crisis.
We are witnessing today one of the greatest movements of human population in the history of the world. This is the conclusion of population experts as millions of refugees are on the move throughout the world and many of them are heading for Europe. Amnesty International says "We are witnessing the worst refugee crisis of our era, with millions of women, men and children struggling to survive amidst brutal wars, networks of people-traffickers, and governments who pursue selfish political interests instead of showing basic human compassion".1
More than 100,000 migrants – asylum seekers and economic refugees – have descended upon Europe since the beginning of this year, coming from diverse nations in Africa (e.g. Eritrea, Somalia, Nigeria) and the Middle East (Syria, Afghanistan). This is causing a political crisis among European leaders and a social crisis on the ground.
Experts are concluding that today the world is witnessing one of the greatest movements of human population ever known."
Greece and Italy have borne the greatest burden as boatloads of migrants flow across the seas from Turkey and Libya – a journey fraught with danger as people-traffickers overfill unseaworthy fragile boats and set them adrift in the Mediterranean and the notoriously dangerous waters between Turkey and Greece.
Pressure on ports
Malta, Sicily and the southern ports of Italy are struggling to cope with the human influx. The Italians also are complaining that the rest of Europe is not doing enough to help. They are threatening to block HMS Bulwark from docking in their ports to drop off migrants. But a Downing Street spokesman said "Our ships are there to save lives, not to offer people asylum in the UK".2
Britain is taking the same attitude to the mounting crisis across the Channel in Calais where some 3,000 migrants are desperately attempting to board trucks heading for Channel ferries to Dover. They have already travelled thousands of miles to reach Calais and there is increasing desperation among them. A similar situation is in northern Italy where African migrants are camping out at the French border-crossing near Ventimiglia but are being denied access.
More trouble for Greece
The situation is even worse in Greece where tens of thousands of migrants fleeing the conflict in the Middle East have been landing in the popular island resorts of Kos, Lesbos, Tilos and Symi, adding to the economic woes of Greece, whose government is barely able to feed their own unemployed victims of the banking crisis.
The Greek Interior Minister Tasia Christodoulopoulou, warned "The reception systems there, already understaffed and underfunded, have collapsed. It is no surprise that thousands of destitute migrants are milling around in the streets and squares, searching for food and shelter. We simply don't have the money or resources to provide for all of them. It's tragic, I tell you, tragic! And it's going to get worse, really worse, and Europe isn't batting an eyelid. It's watching this unfold with criminal indifference".3
Colonial past
Why is all this happening today? Could it be that Europe is now reaping the harvest of its past history of oppression? For some 400 years British traders, backed by the Army, carried out a policy of colonisation right across the globe until the British Empire controlled one quarter of the world.
Most of the other European nations did the same, carving up Africa, Asia and the Americas into colonies which provided untold wealth to Europe. In doing so, they ignored tribal territories in creating new nations right across the Middle East and Africa, which today are boiling cauldrons of violence and mass murder from which millions of asylum seekers are fleeing.
Europeans carved up much of the world into colonies and then left them with unstable political systems, crippled economies and huge under-development, from which millions are now fleeing."
Europeans were happy to take the raw materials and cheap labour from their colonies and give them bank loans to enable them to purchase our manufactured goods while withholding technical and industrial patents and failing to help them develop the means of production to compete in global markets.
As a result, in almost all the colonies (except where there was a white majority) we left behind unstable political systems, crippled economies and huge under-development, creating conditions of poverty, unemployment and fragility from which millions are fleeing today.
Scales of justice reversed
The result is a human tidal wave which is now threatening to overwhelm the ageing population of Europe, complicate the continent's fragile economic and political state and irrevocably change its culture. This is not to overemphasise Europe's woes at the expense of the migrants, who are undoubtedly suffering most. It is to draw attention to our largely forgotten colonial history, which may be coming back to haunt us now in ways that will actually transform the fabric of the entire continent.
Could what is happening in Europe be related to what the biblical prophets see as a principle of justice that is built into Creation? The Prophet Jeremiah foresaw judgement falling upon the Babylonian Empire after 70 years and Isaiah said, "The Lord Almighty has a day in store for all the proud and lofty, for all that is exalted and they will be humbled." (Isa 2:12) He went on to declare that when this happens - "The Lord Almighty will be exalted by his justice, and the Holy God will show himself holy by his righteousness." (Isa 5:16)
God's basic principles of justice are built into creation- if we deliberately go against them, there will come a time when the scales are reversed."
The evidence of the Bible shows that God has built into his Act of Creation three basic principles: equality, justice and love. All men and women are created equal in the sight of God and therefore no one has the right to oppress others. Justice and love are part of the revealed nature of God.
When we deliberately go against these basic principles, we actually bring upon ourselves a time when the scales of justice are reversed. When this happens, it is a triumph of the justice of Almighty God, the Creator of the Universe. Could this be what is happening in Europe today? At least in part, is the migration crisis a legacy of colonialism that we ourselves sowed?
References
1 The Times 16.06.15
2 Ibid.
3 The Times 12.06.15