France to push migrant issue during EU presidency, Macron says

French President Emmanuel Macron delivers a speech at the AMF Congress, the annual meeting of French mayors in Paris, France, November 18, 2021. Thibault Camus/Pool via REUTERS

PARIS (Reuters) - France will push for action on migration when it hosts the European Union presidency from January, President Emmanuel Macron was quoted as saying on Thursday, and he vowed to quickly crack down on illegal migrant camps in northern France.

France takes the rotating presidency of the EU in six weeks' time just as the bloc is confronted by a new crisis with Belarus engineering major migrant flows https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/more-migrants-try-enter-poland-belarus-east-west-standoff-2021-11-18 by flying them from the Middle East and pushing them to attempt to illegally cross its borders into Poland and Lithuania.