EU ministers backed French proposals today for a common policy to stem illegal immigration and said they expected it to be adopted in October, despite accusations of xenophobia from outside the EU.
Spain said it was happy with changes to the "European Pact on Immigration and Asylum" discussed by interior ministers from the 27 EU states in Cannes, having previously expressed concern about proposals to ban mass legalisations of migrants.
"I am satisfied with the changes, it is important to have a common policy on immigration," Spanish Interior Minister Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba told reporters.
France has made harmonising the bloc's immigration policy a priority of its six-month EU presidency that began this month.
Under its plan, EU states would pledge to boost the fight against illegal migration and expel more illegal migrants, while promoting legal migration and a common asylum policy by 2010.
Spain had insisted its 2005 "regularisation" of 700,000 illegal immigrants could not be ruled against the law.
An updated version of the French plan drafted after French Immigration Minister Brice Hortefeux visited Madrid last week dropped a call for states to avoid mass legalisations but said legalisation should be on a "case-by-case" basis.
Sweden still wants the text broadened to encourage legal migration to fill whatever skill shortages exist, rather than emphasising "highly qualified" workers. "We do not only need highly skilled, but also construction workers and others," its State Secretary for Justice Gustaf Lind said.