On Tuesday 24 and Wednesday 25 May, during an informal meeting of the SCIFA Group (Strategic Committee on Immigration, Frontiers and Asylum), the French Presidency of the Council of the EU will try to reconcile the points of view of the Member States on the ‘solidarity’ aspects of the Pact on Migration and Asylum, in particular through a commitment on their part to the voluntary relocation of people disembarked and rescued at sea.
It will test support for a solidarity declaration on a temporary solidarity mechanism, which is intended to complement an expected agreement at the Home Affairs Council on 10 June on the ‘screening’ and Eurodac regulations.
The credibility of this temporary solidarity mechanism and the importance of the support it will receive from the EU27 is one of the conditions set by the so-called ‘Med5’ countries, namely Italy, Cyprus, Malta, Spain and Greece, for accepting new responsibilities. They have recently made this clear again by expressing their views on the French compromise on the Eurodac Regulation (see EUROPE 12957/14).
The Marseille meeting will in fact be used to “determine the commitment” of member states to establish a sufficient critical mass, a source said.
The French Presidency, in a draft statement to the meeting, will propose that willing countries assist both countries facing landings of people rescued in the Mediterranean Sea, but also, more broadly, Cyprus in addressing its particular challenges.
Noting that the war in Ukraine and the refugee influxes it has generated may prevent some countries from participating in this project, it also notes that participating Member States may have preferences about the nature of the groups of people they decide to assist.
It does, however, propose some fixed criteria, notably mathematical, with an indicative target number of relocations for each participating Member State, calculated on the basis of the total target number of relocations for Member States set by the Commission in relation to the average GDP and population size of all Member States accepting relocation.
To ensure the predictability of the mechanism, minimum and maximum indicative annual relocation volumes will be set for all Member States participating in the mechanism, based on the total EU targets. This solution is already contained in the Regulation on Asylum and Migration Management, and the Presidency would therefore like this temporary mechanism to be a precursor to the mechanism that will emerge from the negotiations on this text of the Pact on Migration and Asylum.
In the event of situations of particular pressure on the reception system of a Member State, the latter may also temporarily reduce its commitment to relocation.
The Presidency will also determine criteria for the financial support that could be offered to countries not wishing to take in people, with a similar calculation method and the possibility of temporarily reducing it in case of migratory pressure. A minimum indicative contribution will be provided on this point for each Member State.
The formula also provides for direct financial transfers between Member States, and the Commission will determine the Member States to which the financial contribution will be made.
It will also coordinate the mechanism, but it will also be possible to contribute by providing support in terms of reception structures, monitoring, control, detention and return. This material solidarity will be counted as financial solidarity.
These provisions are not new as such and fall within the parameters already tested in recent years.
In Marseilles, the southern EU countries will have to decide whether the new wording is more relevant to their concerns, since rescue operations at sea do not involve large influxes of people, but the ‘Screening’ and Eurodac regulations will mean more obligations for these same southern countries.
The proposed solidarity mechanism is in any case being closely scrutinised by NGOs such as SOS Méditerranée, which would like to see more predictability in disembarkation operations in EU ports. (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)