Tim Eaton
Phase 2: Europe intervenes: 2015-2017
Criminalization in Niger
By 2015, migration through the central Mediterranean via Libya and the Eastern Mediterranean via Turkey led to growing hostility among European governments and populations.
Discussion of a ‘migration crisis’ emerged, and European policymakers targeted the movement of people in northern Niger and on the northwestern Libyan coastline. This succeeded in stemming the movement of people, but had significant second-order effects that further endangered those on the move, entrenching Libya’s conflict economy and criminalizing historic and long-standing cross-border movements via Niger.
A turning point for the migration economy in Agadez came in May 2015, when the government of Niger, in consultation with the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime and with technical and financial support from the EU and EU member states, passed Law 2015-36. Often referred to as ‘Law 36’, the legislation outlined clear punishments for those engaged in migrant smuggling. In pressing for this, European policymakers were trying to sidestep the policy quagmire faced in Libya. The policy had deep consequences in Agadez.
One humanitarian cost was the increase in migrant deaths in the desert. As early as 2017, the International Organization for Migration and the Nigerien Red Cross reported increased fatalities as smugglers abandoned migrants in the desert when detected by Nigerien authorities and took more perilous routes to avoid detection.
Another was the development of protection markets and the growing presence of armed ‘bandits’ from southern Libya and Chad in northern Niger. These bandits, active along key transit corridors linking gold sites to trading and logistics hubs, have brought heavy weaponry from Chad and southern Libya.
The rise of heavily armed ‘Chadian’ bandits in northern Niger became a source of resentment among local communities, particularly ethnic Tuareg whose ability to move throughout the region and exert control over licit and illicit activities is constrained by their presence. In interviews with Chatham House, several Tuareg leaders stressed a need to ‘securitize’ or ‘militarize’ northern Niger to restore order.
At the time of criminalization, migration was estimated to have provided direct employment for more than 6,565 people and indirect incomes to more than half of all households in Agadez. However, the crackdown in Agadez coincided with a gold rush throughout much of northern Niger, offsetting the economic impact somewhat.
More widely, criminalizing migration eroded trust between local populations and their government, as well as between local officials and the national government. The crackdown disproportionately affected Agadez, home to communities that have traditionally felt marginalized by the government in Niamey.
This in turn reinforced narratives that the national government was willing to sacrifice the well-being of northern communities to ensure that international funds tied to cooperation continued to flow to central government.
Intervention in the Mediterranean and engagement with Libyan authorities
Two further changes significantly shifted the status of migrant smuggling on the Libyan coastline. First, on 2 February 2017, Italy signed a memorandum of understanding with the Government of National Accord in Tripoli, followed a day later by the Malta Declaration signed by EU leaders in Valletta.
Over 2017–2018, the Libyan Coast Guard became responsible for search and rescue missions near the Libyan coast. Over this period, European state rescue missions withdrew from Libyan waters, while NGO rescue missions were prevented from operating in Libyan waters.
The European naval mission Sophia, which had rescued about 48,000 migrants in the Mediterranean between 2015 and 2018, was replaced by a new mission, Irini, in 2020. Irini suspended deployment of naval forces and relied solely on unmanned aerial vehicles not equipped for sea rescues.
Second, a market for ‘anti-smuggling’ emerged on Libya’s northwest coastline over summer 2017. Armed groups that had facilitated migrant smuggling sought to evade UN sanctions. A conflict ensued in the Libyan coastal city of Sabratha lasting 19 days and armed groups complicit in smuggling posed as actors trying to prevent it.
Arrivals to Italy from Libya fell from 162,895 in 2016, to 108,409 in 2017 and 12,977 in 2018. But the numbers of migrants traversing Libya did not immediately fall. A large number of migrants were already present in Libya and other areas used by smuggling networks were not directly affected. This led to a spike in the numbers of migrants in Libya, and an increase in migrant detentions.
Phase 3: Regulation (2018-2024)
In the years since, numbers of migrants arriving in Italy have rebounded, reaching 49,740 in 2023, still well below the 2016 high. The EU has defended the partnerships developed with Libyan authorities as supporting the rule of law and compliant with EU laws. The reality has been murkier.
In particular, the penetration of Libyan state institutions by armed groups and the development of a conflict economy meant that the EU’s partners were themselves deeply involved in smuggling.
The Libyan Coast Guard and the Department for Countering Illegal Migration were accused of being complicit. A prominent Coast Guard commander was even sanctioned for his role in trafficking.
The changes provided financial support for migration management without removing financial incentives for migrant smuggling. Armed groups have profited from both prevention and facilitation of irregular migration at the same time.
The balance between the two created some regulation of migrant smuggling without stopping it. It also provided further resources for armed groups by financing detention centres, training and equipment. Arbitrary detentions increased, and a system of ‘abuse for profit’ whereby migrants were exploited, extorted and in many cases sexually abused grew dramatically.
Locally, where the presence of large migrant communities has caused tension, the armed groups presented themselves as guarantors that migrants do not remain in communities. All the while, they have cut deals with smugglers who bring migrants to the communities in the first place.
Where next?
Smuggling delivers economic benefits to communities at departure points, transit hubs and populations in countries of origin.
Remittances have become a key source of income in Nigeria, while smuggling supports a wider economy in localities that are neglected by Libya’s central government.
Smuggling has stimulated the economies of these places. But the human cost of such activities is high for migrants who suffer systemic rights violations and abuse. A culture of impunity for such actions has prevailed. Policies focused solely on countering criminality miss such nuances that illustrate the need for broader solutions, including local development and peacebuilding.
The need for a true ‘whole-of-route’ approach
The development of migrant smuggling shows how a conflict’s second-order effects can have impacts thousands of miles away. The rise of Mediterranean crossings stimulated European policy responses to target transit points in the Mediterranean Sea and in Northern Niger.
Framed as rule-of-law interventions, these approaches addressed the symptoms rather than causes. Flows have been reduced through a series of transnational bargains that entrench conflict and ultimately make it harder to resolve. The resulting de facto regulation of Mediterranean crossings is regarded as a relative success by EU policymakers, but has not prevented regular disasters at sea and avoidable loss of life.
To date, international approaches have sought to isolate choke points in the movement of people. A more effective policy approach would be to assess how smuggling and trafficking intersect with local dynamics in the places that the practices traverse.
In 2023, the EU laid out its intent to develop a ‘whole-of route’ approach to tackling irregular migration, but this does not extend beyond combatting trafficking and the rescue and return of migrants.
A truly ‘whole-of-route’ approach would need to be broader to be effective. It must contain a wider suite of policies beyond enforcement. That should include peacebuilding activities, local development and governance support so that it reduces demand and tackles the enabling environment within which criminal groups operate. As it stands, current policies run the risk of disrupting smuggling journeys only temporarily, with migrants bearing the worst impacts.
More directly, current policies have incentivized transactionalism in transit states. The huge funds that are being doled out to pay off states is no solution for irregular migration, and harms local populations in Libya. Those funds would be better invested elsewhere.
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Tim Eaton – Senior Research Fellow, Middle East and North Africa Programme
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