Indications show that a large portion of the EU Parliament could be in favour of compulsory burden sharing, The Malta Independent has learnt.

Apart from the EPP, the S&D and ALDE parties are in favour of compulsory burden sharing, a source within the EU Parliament told this newsroom.

The same source said that the EPP and S&D, the two major parties within the European Parliament, are working together on a report. The European Commission, on 13 May will put forward draft legislation on a large number of issues relating to migration and this report will be used to effectively declare whether the Parties agree or disagree with the Commission.

In a statement later published by Roberta Metsola, she said that she, along with S&D MEP Cécile Kyenge are leading this report that will tackle medium to long-term response to migration. "The report aims to suggest measures the European Union can take to respond to migratory flows in the Mediterranean. It will look at every aspect of migration, from how the EU can organise itself to save lives, dismantle trafficking networks, improve fair sharing of responsibility, help countries in sub-Saharan Africa get back on their feet, examine legal options to migration and look at how EU funds in the area are best spent".

Last week EU Member States agreed on a series of emergency measures aimed at doing more to save lives at sea. But according to Dr Metsola, "the measures agreed to by Prime Ministers are an attempt immediate response to an immediate crisis. Our report will go much further and examine all the EU's policies in-depth to see how and where we can do better. We will go beyond an immediate response".

This will help bring around a long term strategy on tackling migration.

The Council and the Parliament will then need to see agreement on the Commission’s proposals. The source told The Malta Independent however, that the Council and the Parliament could butt heads on this issue.

The EPP suggests that quotas be assigned according to a number of issues, including size, socio-economic situations and number of migrants already present within a country, they said during a press briefing.

In the briefing, the EPP group Chair, Manfred Weber, explained that they will call on the Commission for ambitious proposals in this regard. The Group stressed that 2/3rds of migrants coming to Europe are not coming from war-zones and are not refugees, and as such laws must be strengthened to help these people return to their countries after their asylum would be rejected.

He stressed that the Dublin regulations had not done enough, and thus that burden sharing should be latched on. “We do not yet have an idea of what this would look like but we must take into account a country’s size, economy and the number of migrants already living within the country”.

Referring to proposals for solutions that have thus far been made, he said that allowing migrants to freely move to the EU will not work, explaining that even if 1 million refugees were allowed to migrate to the EU freely, there would still be more wanting to cross.

They also mentioned that Christians are the most persecuted religious worshipers in the world at the moment and expressed satisfaction that the topic has finally been put on the agenda for discussion.

S&D Group President Gianni Pittella  called for a holistic EU based strategy during his group’s briefing, however did not give much information as to how this could be tackled. He did however mention the need to go further than what was agreed upon within the Dublin II.

The S&D President expressed his trust in Federica Mogherini, in order to find a solution to the migrant tragedy occurring in the Mediterranean.

Mr Pittella recommends a long-term programme for Africa, where such issues can be tackled at source.

In a separate press conference, EPP MEP’s Monica Hohlmeier and Roberta Metsola, both on the Committee for Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs, spoke of compulsory burden sharing.

They stressed that it is unacceptable for border countries to face the issue on their own.

The EPP also suggests setting up the concept of unsafe third countries, to help speed up the asylum requests for persons from within these countries, while also improving he concept of safe third countries, to accelerate returns procedures in cases of unfounded applications.

The EPP will call on the EU to put more resources in search and rescue operations to save lives and called for EU-UN military navy operations off the Libyan Coast to stop human traffickers.

Human trafficking must be seen on the same level as “organ trafficking, sexual abuse, the sale of children to paedophiles, all the barbarous acts we have witnessed recently. We need to form an alliance against states pulling strings. We need to act together. Its not a problem just for Italian coastguard and member states must work together to tackle the human trafficking issue,” Ms Hohlmeier said.

She added that the African Union and the Arab League must also be involved, and that stabilising a number of African nations should be a priority.

MEP Roberta Metsola for her part said that this is not an idea surrounding Fortress Europe. She added that the EPP will push for information centres to be created within third countries to help spread the word of the danger human traffickers pose.