On Monday 12 May, the members of the European Parliament’s Committee on Civil Liberties were divided over the Commission’s proposal for an initial list of safe countries of origin, with some MEPs from the Renew Europe, Greens/EFA and The Left Groups expressing concern that a country such as Tunisia was included (see EUROPE 13623/1), while others, such as the ECR, welcomed the proposal.
On 16 April, the Commission presented amendments to the Asylum Procedures Regulation (APR) and created an initial list of safe countries of origin including Tunisia, Morocco, Egypt, India, Bangladesh, Kosovo and Colombia.
It also included on this list, without naming them, all the official EU candidate countries, including Turkey and Ukraine, although the latter was suspended from the list for obvious war-related reasons.
While the Commission tried to explain its reasoning and its attempt to harmonise Member States’ practices a little in terms of recognition rates for asylum applications, these left and centre MEPs found it hard to understand why a country like Tunisia, which imprisons “political opponents” or persecutes NGOs and the media, should be on this list, deplored Tineke Strik (Greens/EFA, Dutch).
France’s Fabienne Keller (Renew Europe), for her part, recalled the ill-treatment inflicted by Tunisia on migrants, who are pushed back into the desert and abandoned to their fate.
These elected representatives were not convinced by the Commission’s arguments that these selected countries do not “in general” present a serious risk of persecution or serious harm to their population, although exceptions may exist and must be taken into account by the European authorities processing the asylum application.
The Commission has reiterated the obligation to examine asylum applications individually, even though the aim of this first list is to invite Member States to speed up the processing of these applications - which it is assumed will be unsuccessful - given that the applicant’s country of origin is considered safe.
In general, many elected representatives questioned the sources of information used by the Commission, which relied on the EU Asylum Agency, and the coexistence of this common list with national lists, which could include many more countries.
Marieke Ehlers (PfE, Dutch) also wanted to know whether there was not a contradiction between this list including third countries whose nationals, in exceptional cases, may be mistreated and the EU Court of Justice’s judgment in October, which stipulates that a third country of origin must be considered safe throughout its territory.
The Commission pointed out that the APR Regulation adopted in 2024 now considers that a third country of origin can be safe if its population is not persecuted “in general”, which changes the logic.
In addition, the Commission is due to present its revision of the safe third country concept in the near future, which should this time facilitate the return of illegal immigrants to third countries from which they do not originate. (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)