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Traditional drivers of irregular migration including security
and conflict remain, raising risks in target countries across
Europe and the United States, but also in transit countries
elsewhere, including policy agendas, labor markets, supply chain
resilience, and civil unrest frequency. Alongside these
longstanding drivers, new push factors including the coronavirus
disease 2019 (COVID-19)-virus pandemic and stalled economic and
health recoveries, as well as climate risks and environmental
stressors, are likely to account for an influx in international
migration in the year ahead.
Belarus has emerged as a new gateway for migrants
attempting to enter the European Union since June 2021, raising the
likelihood of security incidents at its borders, particularly with
Poland and Lithuania.
According to reports by credible Belarusian media, there are up
to 20,000 migrants, largely originating from the Middle East
(including Syria and Iraq), currently in Belarus, attempting to
cross into Poland, Lithuania, and Latvia. Since the irregular
migration intensification began in June 2021, at least 10,000 have
already crossed into the EU and thousands more have been prevented
from entering by Polish, Lithuanian, and Latvian border guards.
Until mid-November, there were some 60 direct flights from the
Middle East to Belarus weekly. Upon arrival in Minsk, migrants are
driven to the borders of EU and NATO member states - Poland,
Lithuania, and, in fewer numbers, Latvia. Several airlines
announced that they would stop boarding passengers traveling on
Afghanistani, Iraqi, Syrian, and Yemeni passports to Minsk. Poland
and Lithuania are also likely to deploy the additional military and
police forces to areas bordering Belarus to prevent further
unauthorized entry by irregular migrants. However, this will
elevate the likelihood of violent incidents at the border.
Following the Taliban's takeover of Afghanistan in
August 2021, irregular arrivals into the EU at entry points in
Greece, Bulgaria, and Cyprus are likely to reach up to 10,000 per
month.
With the economy as an immediate challenge for the new Taliban
government, there are multiple potential drivers of migration in
Afghanistan including security issues and food shortages. In the
absence of international recognition, foreign aid flows are likely
to decline sharply. The number of irregular arrivals into Europe
will likely be considerably less than it was in 2015 when more than
1 million irregular migrants reached Europe. Increased migrant
flows from Afghanistan are likely to exceed the capacity of
Bulgarian, Greek, and other authorities in the Balkans to detect
all irregular border crossings.
Moderate cargo disruption from March-April 2022 across
the Balkans and Central Europe is probable, with localized violent
confrontations between irregular migrants and border forces also
being likely.
In the one-year outlook, when weather conditions for irregular
migration sea-crossings improve, cargo delays of up to a couple of
days are likely to increase at the EU's external borders and across
the Western Balkans. Authorities are likely to use force at the
Greece-North Macedonia and Romania-Hungary border crossings with
the main risks of injury and death posed to irregular migrants, NGO
workers, and journalists around those borders. There is a moderate
risk of right-wing and far-right groups in countries such as Greece
and Serbia physically assaulting people perceived as refugees and
migrants in city centers and near refugee facilities.
Water scarcity is likely to become a key migration
driver in Latin America amid the prevalence of structural political
factors.
Despite Latin America possessing roughly 30% of the world's
freshwater resources overexploitation, mismanagement, pollution,
and the impacts of climate change are rapidly increasing the
region's water insecurity. The trend is particularly salient for
Central America's Northern Triangle countries and is likely to
become one of the key drivers of unauthorized northbound migration
in the following years. Government instability and poor economic
prospects in Haiti and Nicaragua have also caused a significant
increase in migration flows from those countries towards the US
during 2021. According to the Famine Early Warning Systems (FEWS)
network, all of these countries are likely to face high
food-insecurity stress in the one-year outlook, mostly due to
severe droughts or floods, resulting in high crop losses,
particularly for self-subsistence farming communities. A slow or
stalled economic recovery from the COVID-19 virus pandemic and
regional governments' unwillingness to contain outflow migration
flows amid the reopening of the US land border on 8 November are
currently the key drivers of northbound migration. Without changes
in these factors, water stress is likely to exacerbate the
instability of the sub-regional political landscape and
increasingly fuel migration in the following years.
Posted 02 December 2021 by Alex Kokcharov, Principal Country Risk Research Analyst, Europe and CIS, IHS Markit and
Blanka Kolenikova, Associate Director – Europe & CIS, Country Risk, IHS Markit and
Jose Sevilla-Macip, Senior Research Analyst, Latin America Country Risk, IHS Markit and
