Let us examine how the best chance in recent years to reform European migration rules will affect the region. Yes, EU countries have achieved the (almost) impossible: an agreement on migration.
Late on a June evening, 21 EU countries reached an agreement, described as historic, to change the system for receiving and relocating asylum seekers on the continent for the first time in years. If this agreement is successfully finalised in negotiations with members of the European Parliament, it could change the situation regarding migration in Europe. Struggle and change are inevitable, but no one has clarity or certainty as to how this policy might ultimately play out.
For now, the agreement provides a balance between two camps: border states that want more help and support in accommodating asylum seekers, and inland states that believe too many migrants are arriving in the EU and moving through its territory without authorisation.
Under the agreement, border states will have to implement a stricter asylum procedure at the border (referring to those who are unlikely to be accepted); countries would also be given more freedom to send rejected applicants back. Elsewhere, EU countries would be given a choice to either accept a certain number of migrants each year or make corresponding contributions to a joint EU fund.
Supporters of the changes view this agreement as a creative middle ground that offers help to border states without effectively forcing other countries to take in asylum seekers. Migration advocates worry that by tightening asylum checks at the border, there will be an increase in the number of inhumane detention centres where people will be held for months on end.
Although the actual legal text has not yet been published, Politico is analysing the details to find answers to essential questions about how the potential agreement could actually affect migration across the EU.
How would the planned agreement change the asylum process in Europe?
Possibly dramatically. Under the agreement, the EU's new asylum system would have two paths: a stricter asylum procedure conducted at the border, which could include a short period of detention, and a more lenient process itself. A pre-screening would determine where each person goes.
The decisive factor: an official's assessment of whether or not a migrant has a chance of being accepted. The goal: to process every application at the border within 12 weeks.
The main benefit for Southern European countries would be this: governments will be allowed to freeze the stricter protocol if it reaches a certain threshold of applicants. This number is set at 30,000 for the EU and is expected to increase each year until it reaches 120,000. Each country will have its own threshold.
Once the relevant limit is reached, the stricter procedure will be frozen. What would this agreement mean for asylum seekers whose asylum application is rejected? Quicker departures to a larger number of countries, not necessarily to the one where they previously lived.
Read the full article