\n The UN document is a statement of intent and aimed at framing migration as an economic issue, says Susi Dennison, a senior policy fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations.\n<\/p>\n
\n It was designed "to de-politicise migration again but the pact has done the opposite", she says.\n<\/p>\n
\n The US, in December 2017, was the first country to pull out.\n<\/p>\n
\n A statement at the time said the agreement was incompatible with US sovereignty and "our decisions on immigration policies must always be made by Americans and Americans alone".\n<\/p>\n
\n Hungary followed in July 2018 - and, at the time, the foreign minister said: "This pact poses a threat to the world from the aspect that it could inspire millions [of migrants]."\n<\/p>\n
\n Criticism in Europe rose as the date for the signing of the agreement approached.\n<\/p>\n
\n Former Donald Trump adviser Steve Bannon and far-right leader Marine Le Pen attended an event together in Belgium to oppose the pact.\n<\/p>\n
\n "The country that signs the pact, obviously signs a pact with the devil," said Ms Le Pen.\n<\/p>\n
\n Polish Interior Minister Joachim Brudzi\u0144ski has said the pact "could also be an incentive for illegal migration".\n<\/p>\n
\n Germany backed the agreement but faced stern opposition. Alice Weidel, leader in the German parliament of the far-right party Alternative for Germany (AfD), said: "In effect, illegal migration is being legalised."\n<\/p>\n
\n A key reason why this pact has been the focus of so much debate is because immigration is a huge topic in Europe, says Ms Dennison. And it will continue to be in the run up to European Parliament elections in 2019.\n<\/p>\n
\n "Opposition to the pact underlines that migration is the number one political issue in Europe. It really is the dividing issue for electorates."\n<\/p>\n
\n \n<\/p>\n
\n \n<\/p>\n
\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The UN document is a statement of intent and aimed at framing migration as an economic issue, says Susi Dennison, a senior policy fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations. It was designed "to de-politicise migration again but the pact has done the opposite", she says. The US, in December 2017, was the first […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2930],"tags":[3065,3064],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.notebookbattery.co.nz\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2029"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.notebookbattery.co.nz\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.notebookbattery.co.nz\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.notebookbattery.co.nz\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.notebookbattery.co.nz\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2029"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.notebookbattery.co.nz\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2029\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.notebookbattery.co.nz\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2029"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.notebookbattery.co.nz\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2029"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.notebookbattery.co.nz\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2029"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}