The European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC) strongly condemns those EU Member States that have decided not to sign the United Nations' Global Compact for Migration, due to be adopted 10-11 December in Marrakesh, after one year of negotiations.

Austria, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia have said they will not sign, while others including Belgium and Italy have yet to decide.

The Compact is the first-ever UN global agreement on a common approach to international migration in all its dimensions, and is based on state sovereignty, responsibility-sharing, non-discrimination, and human rights.

ETUC Secretary General Luca Visentini says: "I urge all EU countries to sign the UN Migration Compact. A refusal to sign is a snub to the UN and to international cooperation, and would be another setback for a shared and solidarity-based approach to migration management. Politicians are foolish to believe that the challenge of migration can be solved by national sovereign policies. A multilateral and cooperative approach is needed now more than ever to optimise the overall benefits of migration and defeat nationalism and xenophobia."