“The safety of Syrians in Europe must not be sacrificed to political interests”, warned Amnesty International on Tuesday 10 December following the decision by several European governments to suspend asylum applications from Syrians following the ousting of President Bashar al-Assad (see EUROPE 13541/8).
“The situation in Syria is extremely volatile. Five decades of brutality and repression cannot be undone overnight. But European governments have wasted no time halting asylum applications of Syrians”, commented Eve Geddie, Director of Amnesty International’s European Union office, in a press release.
In her opinion, “in this period of turbulence and change, countries should avoid plunging Syrian refugees and asylum seekers into further uncertainty and insecurity”.
Questioned again on the subject, the European Commission reiterated that asylum applications “must always be assessed on an individual basis. However, Member States have the option of postponing the examination of applications in the event of changes in the country of origin [...] People who are not entitled to protection may then be subject to a return decision”, but it is important to monitor “the situation on the ground”, the Commission added. In addition, returns to Syria can also be voluntary, but these returns “should be safe and dignified”.
The EU interior ministers, meeting in Brussels on Thursday 12 December, are expected to raise this issue at their lunchtime meeting on migration policies. According to Euronews, Austria is already preparing a programme to expel Syrians, reassessing the status of 40,000 refugees.
At the beginning of December, the Member States discussed the concept of a ‘safe third country’ (see EUROPE 13540/7). However, according to one source, the possibility of reconsidering returns to Syria had not been raised.
The ‘safe third country’ concept aims to simplify asylum procedures by making it easier to declare certain applications inadmissible.
In July, several Member States had already expressed the wish to consider Syria as a country with safe areas in order to return Syrian refugees or asylum seekers to these areas (see EUROPE 13458/8).
The new regulation on asylum procedures, applicable from 2026, will introduce the possibility of classifying a country as safe, with exceptions for certain parts of its territory or for certain categories of applicants. (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)