On Monday 5 September, the European Commission stated that the European Union still sought to reinvolve Greece within the normal operations of the Dublin regulation by the end of the year. This announcement follows the announcement made by the German Minister for the Interior, Thomas de Maizière, on Sunday 4 September, in which he said that his country may resume the transfers of asylum seekers from Germany to Greece as from 2017.
"We have done a lot of work in Europe to improve the situation in Greece", the German minister informed the Welt am Sonntag newspaper, and this should result in the asylum seekers arriving in the EU via Greece being able to be sent back. The Greek Minister for Migration, Yannis Mouzalas, was opposed to this project and pointed out that with regard to the relocation of asylum seekers who are currently in Greece, more than 8,000 dossiers were already ready and were awaiting a response.
The Commission recognised that the pace of asylum seeker relocation from Greece to other member states, such as those that began in September 2015, could be speeded up and that member states should still "fulfil their obligations". So far, out of the 106,000 asylum seekers that member states have promised to take in over a two-year period, only 4,513 people have been relocated, including 1,020 from Italy and 3,493 from Greece.
At the end of 2011, member states decided to stop the transfers of asylum seekers from country to country, in this case, to Greece, which was found guilty on two different counts - for the ill-treatment of those in its care and for its poor reception conditions for asylum seekers . (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)