Meeting in Copenhagen on Tuesday 22 July, after some of them had met on 18 July in Germany at the Zugspitze Summit (see EUROPE 13684/17), Member States’ interior ministers and interior ministers’ representatives once again discussed so-called ‘innovative’ solutions for managing migration and reducing irregular arrivals.
With at least 20 countries now supporting very firm responses, they focused in particular at how to put into practice the return centres in third countries now made possible by the Commission’s new proposal for a regulation on ‘returns’.
Ministers were invited by the Danish Minister of Migration and Integration, Kaare Dybvad Bek, who also called for, in addition to return centres, reception centres for asylum seekers in third countries where applications for protection in the EU would be examined, ‘safe places’ along the lines of the disembarkation platforms envisaged for a time by the EU in 2018.
The Danish Minister of Migration and Integration, Kaare Dybvad Bek, reiterated at the end of the meeting that the current European asylum system “is broken”, and that it was necessary to go beyond the ‘Pact on Asylum and Migration’. While this has its merits, such as the creation of asylum and return procedures at the border, it is necessary to work on strengthening “returns, forging partnerships with key third countries and protecting the EU’s external borders from the instrumentalisation” of migration, he described.
With regard to ‘new solutions’, such as return centres, which would consist of sending to third countries people who have been ordered to leave the country but who cannot return to their country of origin or transit, the Minister nevertheless also acknowledged that giving concrete form to these tools would be “a long process”. This is despite the fact that opinions are now largely “similar” around the EU27 table.
Earlier in the morning, German Minister of the Interior, Alexander Dobrindt, for example, spoke of a new coalition of willing countries to manage more collectively the return to their country of origin of Afghan nationals who are in an irregular situation or who have been convicted.
For European Commissioner Magnus Brunner, it is in any case imperative that any new system created outside the EU respects international law and fundamental rights.
On Tuesday, EU ministers were asked to give their views on the practical feasibility of these return centres, on ways of strengthening the potentially attractive aspects of so-called ‘voluntary’ return procedures, and on the possibility of making greater use of outsourced asylum procedures, notably on the basis of the well-known ‘Rwanda’ model.
While the UK has not been able to legally implement this partnership, which consisted of sending asylum seekers who arrived in the UK to Rwanda to have their asylum application - for the United Kingdom - processed there, Denmark has still not abandoned the project.
In the morning, the Minister had already set the tone, addressing both the networks of smugglers and the third countries using migration against the EU, such as Russia and Belarus.
It is necessary to ensure that the processing of asylum procedures for the EU “is not necessarily done within the European Union”, he said, and the examples of Rwanda, the Albanian model or Nauru, in Oceania (where Australia sends migrants intercepted at sea who wish to apply for asylum in Australia), are very “good”.
“What they sell [smugglers or third countries] is a product and the product is access to various European countries. If we devalue that product or make it impossible for them to come, then it will will be much more difficult for them to transfer people”. And all these ‘innovative solutions’ must involve partnerships with key third countries, added Kaare Dybvad Bek.
At the press conference, he also said that it was up to the Commission to initiate these contacts with third countries, whereas some believe, on the contrary, that the initial pilot projects can only come from bilateral initiatives or from a small group of Member States canvassing potentially open third countries together.
The Netherlands is said to be working on a return centre project with Uganda.
Horn of Africa and Central Asia. On the subject of ‘return centres’, some countries have been a little more specific in public, and have said they hope to see an initial pilot project for the EU under the Danish Presidency of the EU Council.
The Swedish State Secretary for Migration, Anders Hall, believes that these return mechanisms, which are of great interest to his country, could be discussed with countries in “the Horn of Africa (...) and also Central Asia”.
The State Secretary insisted that these return centres should be located as close as possible to the countries of origin.
The Greek Minister of Migration, Anthanasios Plevris, also wants to see these future ‘return hubs’ outside the European continent.
Making voluntary return less attractive. Other ministers focused more on negative measures concerning the legal period of voluntary departure given to people subject to an obligation to return, set at 30 days. Some countries consider it too long, as it could encourage people to flee.
French Minister, Bruno Retailleau, hoped that the regulation on returns would “put things back in their place” and that “forced removals” would become the norm.
While the Minister supports the ‘return centres’ initiative, he focused mainly on the success of the reform of the ‘Returns’ Directive and its more restrictive provisions. In his view, the implementation of the ‘Pact’ is also an essential condition for the effectiveness of European policies. (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)