The European Commissioner for Home Affairs, Ylva Johansson, questioned, on Monday 18 January, in an interview with several media, the words of the Director of the European Border and Coast Guard Agency (Frontex), Fabrice Leggeri, delivered before the European Parliament at the beginning of December 2020 about the allegations of pushbacks of migrants (see EUROPE 12613/7).
The commissioner said that certain remarks about delays in the hiring of staff dedicated to monitoring Frontex's respect of migrants' fundamental rights were “not true” reported the French newspaper Le Monde.
In addition, the Statewatch site published a letter sent to Mr Leggeri by the Director General of the Commission's Migration and Home Affairs Services (DG Home), Monique Pariat, in which she expresses her “dismay” after his hearing at the European Parliament.
The head of Frontex, who is under investigation by OLAF for these alleged pushbacks, but also for accusations of harassment and poor administration, had explained that the hiring of people and the introduction of new provisions for fundamental rights planned for early December had been delayed by various procedures linked in part to actions by the Commission itself.
A report that Ms Pariat rejects outright. The new obligations include the establishment of an independent and fully operational human rights office, an accessible complaints mechanism and a credible reporting mechanism for serious incidents.
A Fundamental Rights Officer is also supposed to be appointed to lead a team of at least 40 Fundamental Rights Monitors that Frontex was legally obliged to recruit before 5 December.
Different versions
Fabrice Leggeri had said he had given priority to the rapid recruitment of this staff, but, according to him, the vacancy notices published by Frontex had been withdrawn at the request of the Commission and republished in November 2020. The official explained, however, that the consent of the Agency's Management Board was required and that, otherwise, the vacancy notices would have been subject to irregularities.
But the director of Frontex is said to have over-emphasised these problems of procedures and irregularities, which the official instead saw as a way of dragging things out.
According to the Greek newspaper Kathimerini, the Frenchman even simply expressed his reticence about these hirings and showed very little eagerness to meet the 5 December deadline, quoting internal agency sources.
New Management Board
At the end of 2020, several MEPs called for the resignation of Mr Leggeri after a hearing in the Parliament during which he denied any involvement of the agency in migrant pushbacks. But Leggeri has no intention of resigning, according to AFP.
Four Frontex Management Board meetings have been held since November on this case and a new meeting took place on 20-21 January in Warsaw, the agency's headquarters.
Findings on investigations into pushbacks were to be reported and questions on the recruitment process were also on the agenda, the Commission said.
It said it was “convinced that with the process put in place by the Management Board and with the cooperation of the Executive Director, these issues can be dealt with constructively”. “The Commission is ready to work with the Management Board and the Executive Director on this issue”, commented Ms Johansson's spokesperson's office. (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)