I sometimes think of the former EU home affairs commissioner Ylva Johansson, who just six years ago spoke of crafting a European migration policy with “cool heads and warm hearts”. What’s happened since is the exact opposite.

Governments across Europe – with the exception of Spain – are cracking down harder than ever before on migrants through measures they once dismissed as politically toxic. It is a dream come true not only for the EU’s far right but also for mainstream conservatives and centre-left politicians such as Denmark’s Mette Frederiksen.

The latest version of the EU migration and asylum pact, expected to become operational on 12 June, includes the building of offshore processing centres and third-country deportation hubs, and gives governments expanded detention powers – including the right to detain children – and the authority to fast-track removals.

The new deportation rules will enable what more than 80 human rights organisations call “ICE-style” detection, raids, detention and offshore return practices across Europe. Mélissa Camara, a Green MEP, quite rightly calls the pact a “legal arsenal serving a xenophobic ideology”. Undeterred by the critics, however, the European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen keeps partnering with strongmen and authoritarian governments. The EU is in effect paying them to keep out unwanted migrants.

The unsavoury circle with which the EU is prepared to do business has now widened to include the Taliban. For the first time, the EU Commission’s home affairs directorate is preparing to host talks in Brussels with a delegation of Taliban representatives from Afghanistan. Against warnings........

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