Requested by 15 Member States in May 2024 and provided for in the Asylum Procedure Regulation (APR) of 2024, the European Commission published a review of the ‘safe third country’ (STC) concept on Tuesday 20 May.
This revision now makes it optional for a connection criterion to be taken into account when returning a person whose asylum application has been rejected in the EU to a third country from which they do not originate, but which could also offer them equivalent protection, although this country must always be ‘safe’.
A Member State will still be able to take into account a specific and thorough connection, if its law so stipulates, but Member States that wish to do so may simply consider that transit alone (a third country through which the migrant would have passed and would have had logistical support before coming to the EU) may be a sufficient link to apply the ‘safe third country’ concept.
In the absence of a link or transit, the concept may also be applied to refuse asylum applications if there is an agreement or arrangement with a given safe third country. However, this option will not apply to unaccompanied minors.
The revision also makes optional the automatic suspensive effect of an appeal filed to challenge inadmissibility decisions regarding asylum applications taken on the basis of this concept.
This means that Member States will no longer have to wait for the outcome of these appeals to determine which third country is able to process the asylum application. The Commission considers that abolishing the automatic suspensive effect of appeals “could help reduce procedural delays in applying the STC concept and prevent potential abuses of appeal opportunities by the applicants”.
However, if a third country were to refuse in all cases to process the asylum application in question, the EU country would be obliged to examine the asylum application again.
The concept of the third country’s ‘safety’ has not been altered by this amendment, as the third country in question must offer adequate conditions for asylum, such as accommodation, benefits and access to health care, and ban refoulement or any form of ill-treatment.
Reactions. While this concept of a ‘safe third country’ is not new and was already implemented in 2016 with Turkey, this new relaxation worries some groups in the European Parliament.
For Fabienne Keller (Renew Europe, French), rapporteur for the APR regulation, removing the link between the asylum seeker and a ‘safe third country’ is “problematic. This means that a migrant could be sent to a third country with which he or she has no connection and could find himself or herself in a situation of vulnerability or even abuse. Another risk is the indefinite duration of this type of situation, since we have no means of control in the third country in question”.
She also considers the removal of the suspensive effect of appeals to be worrying. Furthermore, she regrets that this text is being proposed before the ‘Pact’ has even been implemented.
Mélissa Camara (Greens/EFA, French) believes that the Commission “has once again demonstrated that it is giving in to the populist and fanciful rhetoric of the far right. This proposal only aims to tighten up migration policy and accelerate the forced returns of people”.
For Lena Düpont (EPP, German), “establishing common criteria for identifying safe third countries is the missing piece in the Common European Asylum System and a crucial step towards creating an efficient, manageable, and fair system”.
Link to the rules: https://aeur.eu/f/gwp (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)