The political and military weaponisation of migration

On the playing field of warfare and conflict between countries, a new weapon is now being used: migrants and refugees themselves. Children, families and individuals forced to flee their countries of origin are used as objects, stripped of their human status, with different sides "playing tennis" with them between borders. Here are three examples of the so-called "weaponisation of migration" used as a strategy in warfare and international political blackmail. In February 2020 the Erdogan government "sent" 13,000 refugees to the border with Greece, to force the European Union to pay out more money in exchange for serving as its border guard. In May 2021, Morocco allowed 10,000 people to enter Ceuta irregularly, to punish Spain for having allowed the Sahrawi leader of the Polisario Front to be treated at a hospital in Logroño. In autumn 2021 the Belarus regime allowed thousands of refugees to reach the borders of Poland, Latvia and Lithuania, likewise to punish the EU.

This weaponisation of migration forms part of a new type of international policy and tactics of war known as "hybrid" warfare, in that they combine the use of conventional means (military, diplomatic…) with other irregular means, such as migration and fake news to incite xenophobia in host societies. The inhumanity and illegality of this approach have been denounced by organisations calling for an end to the impunity of such systematic violations of the fundamental rights of migrants and asylum-seekers.

Film:Green Border