Poll:
Paris attacks eroded French support for refugees
Some
60 percent now oppose acceptance of asylum-seekers, according to new
survey.
By NICHOLAS VINOCUR
1/27/16, 6:10 PM CET Updated 1/27/16, 6:37 PM CET
PARIS — French
public opinion shifted against welcoming refugees to France after
terrorist attacks in November, a poll showed Wednesday, ending a
brief stretch during which pro and con opinions on the issue were
roughly matched.
The Ifop poll for
Atlantico, which was conducted online in January after the attacks in
Paris and mass sexual assaults on New Year’s Eve in Cologne, showed
that 60 percent of respondents opposed welcoming refugees, versus 40
percent who were in favor.
According to analyst
Jérome Fourquet, the poll signaled a return to a stable distribution
of opinions after a period during which the pro and con camps were
nearly equal — after the publication of a photograph of a toddler
lying dead on a beach in Turkey caused an international stir.
“The discovery of
Syrian passports linked to the authors of the November attacks fed
the fears of those who worry about terrorists infiltrating the
migrant flows,” Fourquet said.
Officially, France
favors a measured approach to the migration question and has vowed to
accept 30,000 asylum applicants. But so far just 62 refugees from
Syria, Iraq and Eritrea have been assigned homes in France, after
being registered at “hotspots” in Greece.
While thousands more
migrants reside in French towns like Calais or Dunkerque, where they
occupy makeshift camps, few are seeking asylum in France and most
hope to travel onward to Britain.
By contrast Germany
took in an estimated 1 million refugees last year and Chancellor
Angela Merkel has resisted calls to place a ceiling on the number to
be accepted in the future.
Officials argue that
France wants a European solution to the migrant question and pressed
early on for setting up hotspots to process arriving asylum-seekers.
Delays in making hotspots effective have slowed the relocation of
asylum-seekers throughout the EU, including France.
But aid workers and
critics point to another reason behind French slowness: concerns that
diverting budgets in towns to welcoming migrants could bolster Marine
Le Pen’s far-right party.
“When [Europe]
asked France to raise the number of refugees it was welcoming, the
concern was to say, ‘but what are the economic repercussions
locally?’ They were a bit stuck due to the context of the last
elections and the rise of the National Front,” said Jean-François
Dubost, a migration specialist at the Amnesty International aid
group.
Authors:
Nicholas Vinocur
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