Greece and Hungary have sent public statements to the Danish Presidency of the Council of the EU explaining that they will not be able to support the general approach expected from the Council of the EU on 8 December on the concepts of ‘safe third countries’ (STC) and ‘safe countries of origin’ (SCO), accompanied by a common list.
The two texts received the backing of Coreper on Wednesday 26 November, and the Danish Presidency believes it will be able to obtain the green light from the EU27 home affairs ministers on 8 December (see EUROPE 13760/13).
Greece has indicated that it will abstain on the STC text.
While the provisions relating to the concept of ‘safe third country’ reflect and take account of Greece’s main concerns, “the extension of the scope of Article 68(3), on the nonautomatic suspensive effect (of appeals), by including the cases of beneficiaries of international protection in a Member State, goes beyond the intended scope of the review of the Safe Third Country concept as outlined in Article 77”.
The latter text specifies that, without prejudice to the principle of non-refoulement, the applicant and the person whose international protection has been withdrawn do not have the right to remain where the competent authority has taken one of the following decisions:
“(a) a decision which rejects an application as unfounded or manifestly unfounded if at the time of the decision: i) the applicant is subject to an accelerated examination pursuant to Article 42(1) or (3); ii) the applicant is subject to the border procedure, except where the applicant is an unaccompanied minor; b) decision which rejects an application as inadmissible; c) a decision which rejects an application as implicitly withdrawn; d) a decision which rejects a subsequent application as unfounded or manifestly unfounded; - or, and this is the point made by Greece - e) a decision to withdraw international protection”; all this, “except where the applicant is an unaccompanied minor subject to the border procedure”.
For further information: https://aeur.eu/f/jqf
Hungary, for its part, will not be able to support SCO. Reiterating its serious reservations about the ‘Pact on Migration and Asylum’, it has always argued for the automatic inclusion of eligible candidate countries on this list, without imposing any additional conditions on candidate countries to remain on it. It regrets that the compromise text de facto requires eligible candidate countries to meet stricter conditions than others.
For further information: https://aeur.eu/f/jqg
Link to the general approaches: https://aeur.eu/f/jrg; https://aeur.eu/f/jqe (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)