EU Plans for Super Border Force Slammed as 'Undemocratic'

Plans for a new super border force to replace the current EU border agency Frontex have been slammed as "undemocratic" amid a row between the border agency and Warsaw - where it is based - over its diplomatic status.

The creation of a new border force of 1,000 permanent staff with the ability to deploy a corps of 1,500 anywhere in Europe, to secure its borders, was the European Commission's reaction to the current refugee crisis, which has found the EU's external border security wanting.

European Commission First Vice-President Frans Timmermans when announcing the new force, said: "In an area of free movement without internal borders, managing Europe's external borders must be a shared responsibility. The crisis has exposed clear weaknesses and gaps in existing mechanisms aimed at making sure that EU standards are upheld.

"Therefore, it is now time to move to a truly integrated system of border management. The European Border and Coast Guard will bring together a reinforced Agency, with the ability to draw on a reserve pool of people and equipment, and the Member States' authorities, who will continue to exercise day-to-day border management."

However, the plan was condemned as "incompatible with democracy" by Witold Waszczykowski, Poland's foreign minister.

"For it to be a structure independent from nation states is astounding… an undemocratic structure reporting to no one knows who," Waszczykowski said.

European lawmaker Geoffrey Van Orden, the Conservative spokesman on European defense, described the plan as "the thin end of a very dangerous wedge/"

"There will now be efforts to push for creation of an EU coastguard force, specially recruited and under EU command — in effect, an EU coastal navy," Geoffrey Van Orden said.

Diplomatic Dispute

Meanwhile, Brussels was at loggerheads with Warsaw — where Frontex is based and which will be the base of the new organization. There continues to be a long-running dispute over the agency's diplomatic status.

— Frans Timmermans (@TimmermansEU) December 15, 2015​

We need to take decisions quickly to protect our external borders and I'm counting on the Member States to act https://t.co/ZtxFGq8d88

— Frans Timmermans (@TimmermansEU) December 15, 2015​

Normally, such agencies would have diplomatic status and be independent of a host country's laws. However, under a memorandum from 2005, the agency does not have diplomatic status and its workers are subject to Polish law.

Meeting @Frontex Fabrice Leggeri to discuss immediate & future challenges of protecting EU external borders pic.twitter.com/DZLezkgiPa

— Donald Tusk (@eucopresident) December 16, 2015​

Fabrice Leggeri, the executive director of Frontex, quoted in the London Financial Times said that this situation was untenable:

"If tomorrow [the Polish government] wanted to shut us down, they could do it — and that is unacceptable. The agency must be independent and not have to rely on the goodwill of Poland."