European Union ministers have agreed to overhaul the bloc’s asylum procedures after about 12 hours of negotiations to obtain the go-ahead from front-line members Italy and Greece.
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“This is a great, great achievement, showing that it’s possible to work together on migration. We are so much stronger when we work together,” the EU’s home affairs commissioner, Ylva Johansson, said.
After nearly 10 years of elusive negotiation, a new regulation has been reached to replace the current Dublin regulation.
The Dublin regulation, an agreement originally signed in 1990 and revised three times, set out rules determining which member state was responsible for the examination of an asylum application.
In a press release on Thursday, the Council of the EU stated that It agreed on a negotiating position on the asylum procedure regulation and on the asylum and migration management regulation. This position went on to say will form the basis of negotiations by the Council presidency with the European Parliament.
Brussels-based news outlet Politico EU reported that a coalition of about 10 states led by Italy had blocked the agreement until late on Thursday, preventing the bloc from going ahead with the reform without the consent of a country receiving some of the highest numbers of asylum seekers in the EU.
Hungarian government spokesman Zoltan Kovacs on Friday quoted Prime Minister Viktor Orban as saying the agreement was “unacceptable”.
“Brussels is abusing its power. They want to relocate migrants to Hungary with force. This is unacceptable. They want to forcefully turn Hungary into a migrant country,” Kovacs wrote on Twitter.
Speaking on the agreement, Maria Malmer Stenergard, migration minister of Sweden, which currently holds the EU’s rotating presidency stated, “No member state can deal with the challenges of migration alone. Frontline countries need our solidarity. And all member states must be able to rely on the responsible adherence to the agreed rule. I am very glad that on this basis we agreed on our negotiating position.”
The new migration policy contains the following:
Streamlining of asylum procedure: The asylum procedure regulation (APR) establishes a common procedure across the EU that member states need to follow when people seek international protection. It streamlines the procedural arrangements (e.g. the duration of the procedure) and sets standards for the rights of the asylum seeker (e.g. being provided with the service of an interpreter or having the right to legal assistance and representation).
The regulation also aims to prevent abuse of the system by setting out clear obligations for applicants to cooperate with the authorities throughout the procedure.
Border procedures: The APR also introduces mandatory border procedures, with the purpose to quickly assess at the EU’s external borders whether applications are unfounded or inadmissible. Persons subject to the asylum border procedure are not authorised to enter the member state’s territory.
The border procedure would apply when an asylum seeker makes an application at an external border crossing point, following apprehension in connection with an illegal border crossing and following disembarkation after a search and rescue operation. The procedure is mandatory for member states if the applicant is a danger to national security or public order, he/she has misled the authorities with false information or by withholding information and if the applicant has a nationality with a recognition rate below 20%.
The total duration of the asylum and return border procedure should be not more than 6 months.
Adequate capacity: In order to carry out border procedures, member states need to establish an adequate capacity, in terms of reception and human resources, required to examine at any given moment an identified number of applications and to enforce return decisions.
At EU level this adequate capacity is 30 000. The adequate capacity of each member state will be established on the basis of a formula which takes account of the number of irregular border crossings and refusals of entry over a three-year period.
Modification of Dublin rules: The asylum and migration management regulation (AMMR) should replace, once agreed, the current Dublin regulation. Dublin sets out rules determining which member state is responsible for the examination of an asylum application.
The AMMR will streamline these rules and shorten time limits. For example, the current complex take back procedure aimed at transferring an applicant back to the member state responsible for his or her application will be replaced by a simple take back notification.
New solidarity mechanism: To balance the current system whereby a few member states are responsible for the vast majority of asylum applications, a new solidarity mechanism is being proposed that is simple, predictable and workable. The new rules combine mandatory solidarity with flexibility for member states as regards the choice of the individual contributions.
These contributions include relocation, financial contributions or alternative solidarity measures such as deployment of personnel or measures focusing on capacity building. Member states have full discretion as to the type of solidarity they contribute. No member state will ever be obliged to carry out relocations.
There will be a minimum annual number for relocations from member states where most persons enter the EU to member states less exposed to such arrivals.
This number is set at 30 000, while the minimum annual number for financial contributions will be fixed at €20 000 per relocation. These figures can be increased where necessary and situations where no need for solidarity is foreseen in a given year will also be taken into account.
In order to compensate for a possibly insufficient number of pledged relocations, responsibility offsets will be available as a second-level solidarity measure, in favour of the member states benefitting from solidarity. This will mean that the contributing member state will take responsibility for the examination of an asylum claim by persons who would under normal circumstances be subject to a transfer to the member state responsible (benefitting member state).
This scheme will become mandatory if relocation pledges fall short of 60% of total needs identified by the Council for the given year or do not reach the number set in the regulation (30 000).
Preventing abuse and secondary movements: The AMMR also contains measures aimed at preventing abuse by the asylum seeker and avoiding secondary movements (when a migrant moves from the country in which they first arrived to seek protection or permanent resettlement elsewhere). The regulation for instance sets obligations for asylum seekers to apply in the member states of first entry or legal stay. It discourages secondary movements by limiting the possibilities for the cessation or shift of responsibility between member states and thus reduces the possibilities for the applicant to chose the member state where they submit their claim.
While the new regulation should preserve the main rules on determination of responsibility, the agreed measures include modified time limits for its duration:
- the member state of first entry will be responsible for the asylum application for a duration of two years
- when a country wants to transfer a person to the member state which is actually responsible for the migrant and this person absconds (e.g. when the migrant goes into hiding to evade a transfer) responsibility will shift to the transferring member state after three years
- if a member state rejects an applicant in the border procedure, its responsibility for that person will end after 15 months (in case of a renewed application)
Nnamdi Maduakor is a Writer, Investor and Entrepreneur
