Issue 420 | 05 October 2015

Roberta Metsola interview, refugee crisis, ETS overhaul, VWgate, LuxLeaks, dog & cat welfare and more...

This issue’s cover story focuses on Europe’s ongoing refugee crisis, beginning with an exclusive interview with Roberta Metsola, Parliament’s co-rapporteur on the situation in the Mediterranean and need for a holistic EU approach to migration. The Maltese MEP is frustrated that, “member states can easily agree on how many plastic bags they can throw away, but when bodies of children are washing up on our shores, and we still cannot agree on how to deal with refugees humanely, it seems to me everything else we do is of little use”.

Her co-rapporteur Cécile Kyenge writes about her recent visits to Lampedusa and Hungary and warns against “gambling on the potentially explosive nature of the unheard proportions of this exodus, and the economic crisis”. We also hear from Parliament’s shadow rapporteurs on the dossier, who all agree that Europe must act soon, or continue to face the tragic consequences.