Juncker Plans Big EU Border Guards Boost

Strasbourg (France): The EU plans to send 10,000 more border guards to tackle unlawful immigration by 2020, the European Commission’s President Jean-Claude Juncker said in his annual state of the union address on Wednesday. The Luxembourg politician, whose tenure as head of the European Union’s executive arm is to end in 2019, called for more solidarity, rather than “ad-hoc solutions” for people on migrant ships, the BBC reported.

His speech also tackled the region’s other burning issues like populism, terrorism and Brexit. He also proposed a new Africa-Europe alliance, based on co-operation rather than charity, leading to a continent-to-continent free trade agreement. Juncker recommended that the euro be used more strategically as the biggest currency after the dollar. “The euro must become the face and the instrument of a new, more sovereign Europe,” he said. (IANS)