The classics had a phrase for it: “The mountains gave birth and all that emerged was a ridiculous mouse”.

For all the tension and drama engendered by the massive influx of illegal immigrants, and for all the government’s brave words about doing something about it, all that has emerged is a draft bill “to fight abuses in applications for refugee status”. This is far too little.

The rise in numbers of incoming illegal immigrants has stopped making sense. With boatloads of 140, 170 coming in on an almost daily basis and with no repatriation on an equal level, the numbers of illegal immigrants, would-be refugees and people in between are by now far beyond what the armed forces can cope with, what the country can hold and what the population can accept.

This crisis is growing by the day and for all the placebo statements by politicians and those who would like to see Malta being compassionate and kind to such unfortunates, the rumbling at ground level cannot be silenced now. The country and its leaders play deaf to such rumbling at their peril.

It is clear this is a situation that cannot be solved on a local basis only. But so far Malta has been fed a load of rubbish when it asked for help. Only one country, The Netherlands, has offered to take in some of the illegal immigrants, and then only some 17. A British minister who visited recently reportedly told the Maltese leaders to roll up their sleeves, and no Maltese minister showed him the door. The Italian deputy prime minister came, and saw, promised a high level meeting sometime in November and said Europe must help.

What is worse is having Minister Tonio Borg first telling Financial Times journalist Godfrey Grima that the government was considering suspending its international obligations, only to tell MaltaToday (14 August) that he never said that. No letter to rebut the Godfrey Grima article has appeared in the Financial Times, and none will most probably be sent, because Mr Grima has the notes of the interview and stands by what he wrote.

Mr Grima also says that in the interview Dr Borg told him Malta was also prepared to ask the US for help. The EU has continued on its own sweet way and for all its commiseration with Malta’s ill luck, Malta is still being kept out of the regular meetings of five Mediterranean EU countries which meet specifically on the issue. It then sent €100,000 from its emergency fund and Commissioner Frattini has now promised a slice of the €14 million from now to 2007 for all countries in the Mediterranean. And more in the next budget after that. Such help!

And a forthcoming EU directive will halve the time illegal immigrants can stay in closed centres to six months. What is the government’s position on this?

It very much seems that the government has still not woken up to the sure ways which seem to work in the EU. Look at Austria that even today is blocking the start of negotiations with Turkey reportedly to boost Croatia’s chances. And how Cyprus keeps harping on the Turkish issue because it is in its interest to do so. Unless the government of Malta makes a strong stand, the EU will continue to disregard the whole tragic situation.

Then there is Libya, whence the illegal immigrants come from. This newspaper has long been saying, for all the government’s vociferous denials, that Malta is no longer held in high esteem by the Libyan government, both for a series of causes, some of them not this government’s fault, and also because Libya has now found the US, and all those who helped it during the embargo can now be conveniently side-stepped.

But then the government has still not used all the cards it could use. People like Dom Mintoff and Karmenu Mifsud Bonnici, and even John Dalli himself, are listened to with great respect, far more than any Foreign Minister or Prime Minister. It does not seem that the government has even thought of roping in these people and tried to get their help.

Nor does it seem, at least from what was said over the past days, that the government is careful enough to keep the Opposition in the loop on this very crucial issue, especially at a time when the Opposition is really being so prudent, as it was at Birzebbuga last Sunday, when it could have gone along with the anti-immigrant sentiment.

But primarily, what needs to be done must be done here. The bill the government presented to Parliament last week includes the possibility of the immigrants being sent back to closed detention if they are “un-cooperative”. That is good but far more is needed.

What about, for instance, the use of Internet cafes. According to The Guardian last week, anyone using an Internet café in Italy now has to have his passport with him, a log is kept of the machine he uses and the time he uses it. This is being done due to the new concern about security but could be adopted here, and enticing others to come here made a criminal offence.

So too, as this newspaper suggested earlier, should giving wrong information at any stage be made a criminal offence.

Basically, the whole concept of an illegal immigrant has to be clearly defined. It is one thing for a person running away from civil war to cross the border into a neighbouring country but a completely different thing for a person to persuade anybody that crossing 100 miles of sea legally amounts to the same thing. It should be far easier to see an illegal immigrant as an interloper in one’s house. Just as a person who breaks into your house is considered a thief until and unless he makes a clear case that was the only way left to him, so too the law should make clear that until proven otherwise, that crossing over to Malta was their last and only chance, illegal immigrants should be considered as just that: illegal people.

Are we waiting for a tragedy on the high seas to happen before we state loud and clear that if people are so crazy as to put out to sea in small boats, they should not endanger the lives of those who are there to help in real emergencies, not trumped up ones like these.

Just as we do have a generic duty to help the poor of the world, it does not mean that we have to provide meals to all the millions of hungry people, so too we are in no way bound to rescue those who risk their lives voluntarily, many of who are economic refugees and not really refugees in the strict sense of the word.