The Labour Party (EMEP) from Turkey and the New Left Current for Communist Liberation (NAR) from Greece issued a joint statement calling for an end to the deaths of migrants and refugees in the Mediterranean, a change in refugee policies and the removal of obstacles to the right to asylum.

The statement titled "Stop migrant and refugee deaths" is as follows:

"The European Union’s migration policy causes new mass deaths almost every day. During the summer months, the number of migration journeys across the Mediterranean Sea increase significantly, and many of them end in disaster.

In order to prevent migration from Asia and Africa to Europe, European governments make agreements with countries such as Turkey, Libya, Tunisia and Morocco to keep migrants in those countries, and offer them money they cannot refuse. Those who can manage to reach countries such as Greece and Italy are sent back to their countries of origin and risk death to try again.

The countries that keep migrants in their countries for Europe benefit from this not only because they receive money from Europe, but also through excessive exploitation through illegal labour. Migrant workers are employed in these countries as modern slaves without insurance, without trade unions, and for wages far below the minimum wage, thus reducing the wage level of native workers.

European bosses, on the other hand, selectively recruit skilled migrants from the countries where they stockpile migrants and fill the labour shortage.

Migration is a result of imperialist exploitation and plunder of the resources and peoples of Asia and Africa. It is normal and justified for the unemployed, starving people, whose lives are shuttered in the wars provoked by the imperialists to weaken their rivals, to migrate to Europe and North America.

It is indefensible for imperialist countries to store an excessive number of migrants in neighbouring countries to the source of the migration on the grounds that migrants would create instability in their countries, and thereby prepare the ground for their re-exploitation.

Therefore, the agreements with Turkey, Libya, Tunisia and Morocco for border closures and readmission, must be cancelled. Borders must be opened for migrants travelling to Europe and North America. In all countries where there are migrants, migrant workers should have the same rights as native workers and should be able to work like other workers.

We demand open borders and free movement for refugees and migrants, ad for the working class.

Down with the Common European Asylum System.

We demand asylum and documentation for all refugees.

Let us fight for an end to capitalist wars and the intervention of powerful states. Let us fight for the common interests of the working class and the oppressed.

Those responsible for migrant deaths must be punished.

We unconditionally defend the rights of migrant workers and refugees.

We express our solidarity with migrant workers and refugees.

Labour Party – Turkey (EMEP)

The New Left Current for the Communist Liberation (NAR) -Greece" (EVRENSEL DAILY)