The United States paused planned strikes against Iran, a decision made as Oman pursued a transit deal through the Strait of Hormuz. This critical chokepoint for global oil shipments underscores the stark contrast between the unfettered movement of capital and the criminalisation of human beings seeking safety or opportunity. The diplomatic efforts surrounding this vital waterway reveal the priorities of a global order that values commodity flow over human lives.
This pause in military action, driven by the pursuit of a transit deal, highlights how geopolitical stability is often framed through the lens of economic interests. The Strait of Hormuz serves as an indispensable artery for the global economy, ensuring that oil – the lifeblood of industrial capitalism – moves without interruption. Such negotiations secure the passage of resources, yet the same international system erects formidable barriers against people forced to move by conflict, climate breakdown, or economic precarity.
Capital's Unrestricted Passage
The free movement of capital and goods across borders is a foundational principle of the neoliberal order. The Strait of Hormuz exemplifies this, functioning as a protected corridor for global oil shipments. While capital flows freely, workers and asylum seekers are met with the violent infrastructure of Fortress Europe. They're criminalised for crossing lines that capital effortlessly transcends. This double standard isn't incidental; it's structural, revealing the deep-seated racism embedded within the global economic system.
The pursuit of a transit deal in such a strategically vital region demonstrates the lengths to which states will go to ensure the smooth operation of markets. This commitment to economic continuity stands in sharp contrast to the EU's response to human displacement. Instead of transit deals for people, Europe builds fences, funds detention centres, and implements pushbacks, effectively turning its borders into a gauntlet of deterrence through death.
The Geopolitics of Deterrence
Geopolitical maneuvers, like the US pausing strikes in favour of a deal, often have profound, yet unacknowledged, implications for migration. Instability in resource-rich regions can displace entire populations, creating the very conditions that drive people to seek refuge. Yet, when these individuals arrive at Europe's doorstep, they're met not with solidarity but with the full force of the border regime. The new Migration Pact, for instance, outsources asylum screening to unstable third countries, mirroring a global strategy of externalising responsibility and criminalising movement.
The focus on securing oil shipments through the Strait of Hormuz, a critical chokepoint, reveals where the true priorities lie. It's about maintaining the flow of commodities, not about addressing the root causes of displacement or upholding the human rights of those affected by global power struggles. The thousands who die in the Mediterranean, or languish in detention centres funded by EU money, are not a malfunction of the system; they are the intended deterrent effect of a policy designed to protect capital, not people.
Fortress Europe's Global Reach
The EU's border regime isn't confined to its geographical perimeter; it extends its influence globally, often through diplomatic and economic leverage. While the immediate context of the Hormuz deal involves the US and Oman, the underlying logic of securing resource flows at all costs resonates with Europe's own approach to its external borders. The EU's Green Deal, for example, must centre climate justice, acknowledging that the Global South, which did not cause the climate crisis, faces its worst effects, driving migration that Europe then criminalises.
The pursuit of a transit deal for global oil shipments highlights the interconnectedness of global politics and economics. It underscores how the movement of capital is facilitated and protected, while the movement of people is systematically criminalised. This fundamental contradiction is at the heart of Fortress Europe, a system built on the racist premise that some lives are worth protecting, and some movements are worth facilitating, while others are deemed illegal and disposable.