What does the pact on migration and asylum contain, on which the European Parliament votes on Wednesday?

Home stretch for negotiations which began more than three years ago. The reform of European migration policy, which toughens control of migrant arrivals in the European Union (EU) and provides for a system of solidarity between Member States for the reception of asylum seekers, is subject to a vote by MEPs, Wednesday April 10. The European Parliament and the Twenty-Seven had already reached an agreement in principle in December.

European elected officials must now definitively validate a series of texts forming this “pact on migration and asylum”, based on a proposal from the Commission in September 2020, when asylum requests in the EU reached 1, 14 million in 2023, their highest level since 2016. After the vote of MEPs, the text must be formally validated by the Council of the EU, before coming into force in 2026. Franceinfo takes stock of the major axes of this vast reform.

Reinforced border controls

The pact provides for an accelerated procedure for examining asylum applications, near the external borders, via a system of “filtering” obligatory and prior to the entry of a migrant into the EU. This process aims to determine within five days whether the applicant should be subject to a return procedure – for example whether they have already been refused asylum – or whether they can actually apply. .

This verification will include identification, health and safety checks, as well as fingerprinting which must feed into the Eurodac database, specifies the Council of the EU. The scope of this database has been expanded and now applies to children aged 6 and over. In addition to those seeking asylum, this screening will also concern people rescued at sea or arrested after illegally crossing the EU’s external borders.

To make their decision at the time of filtering, Member States will be able to take into account the notion of “safe third country” to return an asylum seeker there. They may judge a file inadmissible because the applicant passed through a third country considered to be “on”, where he could have filed a request for protection. However, there must be a “link” sufficient between the person concerned and this third country – without this link being clearly defined in the text.

Member States will have to put in place an independent mechanism to monitor compliance with fundamental rights during filtering. It should make it possible to verify compliance with the principle of non-refoulement (which prohibits a country receiving asylum seekers from returning them to a country where they probably risk being persecuted) and national rules on detention, when these are applied during filtering.

A specific procedure at the border

Migrants whose asylum procedure is deemed admissible after screening, but who statistically have the least chance of obtaining international protection, will be directed to a “border procedure”. This measure concerns nationals of countries for which the rate of recognition of refugee status is, on average in the EU, less than 20% (such as Morocco, Tunisia and Bangladesh). Unaccompanied minors running “a security risk” and families with children will also be affected.

The duration of this procedure is twelve weeks for the examination of the request, to which may be added twelve weeks for the referral procedure, for a maximum of six months in total. The procedure will likely involve detention but, according to French MEP Fabienne Keller, rapporteur for this text, alternative measures to restrict freedoms are also possible. To implement the procedure, it is planned to create 30,000 places in dedicated centers, in order to ultimately accommodate up to 120,000 migrants per year. The NGO Oxfam denounced a “agreement on more detentions, particularly of children and families, in prison-type centers”.

Greater solidarity between Member States to welcome refugees

Until now, European migration policy was based on the text Dublin III. It provides for refugees to apply for asylum in the first EU country they reach. But this regulation has the consequence of placing asylum requests on the countries of southern Europe where the majority of migrants from the Middle East, Asia or Africa arrive. To remedy this, the pact on migration and asylum maintains this system, but adds a mandatory solidarity mechanism.

Other Member States will have to contribute to the cost of countries of entry by taking care of asylum seekers through relocation, or by providing financial support. The Council of the EU plans at least 30,000 relocations per year of asylum seekers, a figure that is nevertheless very low compared to the around 490,000 asylum applications accepted in the EU in 2023, recall The echoes. The financial compensation provided for member countries refusing relocations is 20,000 euros for each asylum seeker.

A specific mechanism in the event of a migration crisis

One of the provisions of the European reform provides for a response in the event of a massive and exceptional influx of migrants into an EU state, such as at the time of the refugee crisis, particularly Syrian, in 2015. The solidarity mechanism of Twenty-Seven in favor of the State concerned will then be triggered more quickly and an exceptional regime, harsher for asylum seekers than in the usual procedures, will be put in place.

This mechanism provides in particular for the extension of the possible duration of detention of a migrant at the external borders of the EU, up to nine months instead of six. The procedures for examining asylum applications could also be faster and simplified for a larger number of exiles, in order to be able to send them back more easily.

This crisis mechanism also applies to situations of“instrumentalization”in the event that a “third country or non-state actor” uses migration to destabilize an EU country. It’s not about “under no circumstances to target” organizations ensuring rescues of migrants at sea, nevertheless assured the Spanish MEP Juan Fernando Lopez Aguilar, rapporteur of the text.