The Guardian Says Europeans Migrate South

According to the British Newspaper ‘The Guardian’, Europeans migrate south as the continent drifts deeper into crisis.Tens of thousands of Irish, Greek, and Portuguese people leave in search of a new life as the eurozone’s woes worsen.

Since its conception, the European Union has been a haven for those seeking refuge from war, persecution and poverty in other parts of the world. But as the EU faces what Angela Merkel has called its toughest hour since the second world war, the tables appear to be turning. A new stream of migrants is leaving the continent. It threatens to become a torrent if the debt crisis continues to worsen, the Guardian says.

Tens of thousands of Portuguese, Greek and Irish people have left their homelands this year, many heading for the southern hemisphere. Anecdotal evidence points to the same happening in Spain and Italy.This year, 2,500 Greek citizens have moved to Australia and another 40,000 have “expressed interest” in moving south. Ireland’s central statistics office has projected that 50,000 people will have left the republic by the end of the year, many for Australia and the US.

The Portuguese are also heading to other former colonies, such as Mozambique and Brazil. According to Brazilian government figures, the number of foreigners legally living in Brazil rose to 1.47 million in June, up more than 50% from 961,877 last December. Not all are Europeans, but the number of Portuguese alone has jumped from 276,000 in 2010 to nearly 330,000, the Guardian adds.

For departing Greeks the top destinations over the years, according to the World Bank, have been Germany, Australia, Canada, Albania, Turkey, UK, Cyprus, Israel and Belgium. Skilled Greeks are particularly likely to leave: as an example of what can happen, 4,886 physicians emigrated in the year 2000 (the last year for which the World Bank’s Migration and Remittances Facebook cites data for departing doctors), meaning the country lost 9.4% of its doctors in that single year.