UN Adopts Global Migration Pact Despite Last-Minute Withdrawals
December 12, 2018
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Representatives from around 150 countries signed the United Nations migration pact in Morocco on Monday. The Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration, as the agreement is formally known, aims to create a legal framework to handle growing migration from impoverished third world countries to the Western world -- overriding the immigration policies of the individual nation states.
German Chancellor Merkel, whose open border policies drew millions of asylum seekers from North Africa and the Middle East into Europe in recent years, hailed the signing of the pact as an "important day." It was is about "nothing less than the foundation of our international cooperation," she added. The German leader "received a standing ovation on Monday after an impassioned speech," the UK newspaper The Guardian reported.