British Prime Minister David Cameron’s most senior representative in the European Parliament, Syed Kamall MEP, has today told the parliamentary chamber in Strasbourg that not only should Middle East countries take more migrants, but so too should the United States of America.
Mr. Kamall, who has previously spoken at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Washington, D.C. will find it hard to make such a speech in the United States itself, where the immigration debate is far more polarised than the United Kingdom’s.
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Mr. Kamall said: “We have to take some refugees into our countries, we have a moral obligation. Yet some countries are doing far more than others. Some countries are struggling to cope.
“Some countries are donating huge sums. Some countries are paying huge bucks, while others are passing the buck. So all countries need to understand the scale of the situation and help with co-ordinated action.
“And when I say all countries, I do not just mean all EU countries. I mean all countries. So while we should support and acknowledged the contribution of Turkey, Jordan and Lebanon, we should also be asking ‘when will the richer Arab countries and the USA step up?'”
His comments drew a smattering of applause from anti-American MEPs in the parliamentary chamber, though Mr. Kamall was also laughed at later on for claiming that it was the Conservative Party and David Cameron who forced through an EU referendum for the United Kingdom. In fact, it was the UK Independence Party (UKIP) which has repeatedly campaigned for the plebiscite, expected to take place in the next two years.
Already, the referendum has taken on a trans-Atlantic theme, with the New York Times’s Roger Cohen being slapped down by UKIP’s deputy leader Paul Nuttall for his falsehoods about a ‘Brexit’ – a British exit – from the EU.