France granted a ten-year residence permit to Xenia Fedorova, former director of RT France and identified as a Kremlin propagandist. The current government shows discomfort, while associates of the former Interior Minister defend that it was an automatic procedure. The case exposes cracks in the immigration system, which allowed a controversial figure to benefit without effective political control.
Immigration filters: when the algorithm doesn't distinguish nuances 🛂
The automatic process for granting long-term residence is based on document checks and criminal records, but lacks a contextual analysis of geopolitical risks. Systems like the EU's VIS (Visa Information System) cross-reference data, but do not assess links to foreign state propaganda. Integrating artificial intelligence with security agency databases could improve detection of sensitive profiles, but its implementation faces legal and budgetary limits.
The automatic procedure: a friend to bureaucrats, an enemy of logic 🤖
That a director of a media outlet sanctioned by the EU receives automatic residence suggests that the French immigration system operates like a robot without judgment. If Fedorova had applied for a library card, perhaps they would have given it to her without asking as well. At least we know that French bureaucracy is equally efficient with propagandists as it is with lost tourists.