The Court of Justice of the European Union ruled (case No. C-406/22) on Friday 4 October, that the designation of a third country as a safe country of origin must extend to the whole of its territory and not just certain parts of it.
In the case of a Moldovan national who applied for asylum in the Czech Republic, the Court of Justice clarified the conditions for a Member State to designate third countries as safe countries of origin under the 2013 Directive on common procedures for international protection.
Firstly, it considers that the fact that a third country (Moldova, in this case) derogates from the obligations arising from the ECHR does not exclude it from being designated as such (a country may in fact derogate from the provisions of the ECHR in the event of war or an exceptional threat to its security).
However, the authorities of the Member States must assess whether the conditions for implementing the right of derogation are liable to call this designation into question. The Court also ruled that EU law precludes a Member State from designating a third country as a safe country of origin for only part of its territory.
In May 2022, a Moldovan national applied for protection in the Czech Republic, citing threats made against him by individuals and not wanting to return to his region of origin due to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The Czech authorities rejected this request on the grounds that Moldova, with the exception of Transnistria, had been designated as a safe country of origin.
The Court found that EU law does not currently allow Member States to designate only part of the territory of the third country concerned as a safe country of origin. “The criteria for designating a third country as a safe country of origin must be met throughout its territory”.
In addition, the Court has “already made it clear that, where a third-country national fulfils the conditions for the grant of international protection laid down by that directive, the Member States are, in principle, obliged to grant the status applied for, since they have no discretionary power in that regard”.
Link to the judgment: https://aeur.eu/f/dq3 (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)