EU aims to speed up returns of refused asylum seekers

BRUSSELS

The European Commission made recommendations Tuesday for European Union member states to speed up returns of rejected asylum seekers as it revealed a new five-year strategy on border management.

“We have to show that we are appropriately dealing with those who do not qualify for international protection,” EU Commissioner for Home Affairs Ylva Johansson said at a news conference presenting the EU executive body’s draft.

“When we fail to return people, it hampers our system and erodes trust to protect the right to apply for asylum,” she said.

Johansson said that last year, EU member countries decided to return 340,000 refused asylum-seekers in total but only 21% of them left the bloc in reality.

She also called on the EU to build “better cooperation with third countries” since EU countries only reached out to countries of origin in 60% of the cases after the return decisions.

In order to “improve these rates,” she asserted, the European Commission proposes that EU member states mutually recognize return decisions and increase their cooperation in executing the verdicts.

In addition, EU countries are also demanded to apply incentives and reintegration guidance to encourage voluntary returns.

The proposal builds on the new updates to the bloc’s border protection and management system, the Schengen Information System (SIS).

Under the rules that entered into force last week, national authorities must create an SIS alert if they decide that a non-EU national cannot legally stay in the EU, and the system will follow up if the person actually leaves the bloc’s territory.

The recommendation subscribes to the European Commission’s five-year strategy on integrated border management which was also revealed on Tuesday.

The action plan outlines “state-of-the-art infrastructure and effective surveillance such as cameras and drones, coherent and comprehensive national and situational pictures, an efficient implementation of the European Border Surveillance System (EUROSUR) and sound risk analysis.”

The strategy also calls for better cooperation with non-EU countries, especially in the bloc’s eastern and southern neighborhood, in “the areas of border control, risk analysis, return and readmission, and anti-smuggling.”

EU member states have yet to officially endorse the European Commission’s recommendations.