The EU Council plans to approve a migration pact containing significant reforms to asylum policy
Kyiv • UNN
The EU Council plans to approve a migration pact containing significant reforms to asylum policies, requiring EU countries to accept thousands of asylum seekers from frontline states or provide resources, and allowing agreements with transit and origin countries to limit the number of incoming migrants.
EU ministers are going to approve a set of measures on migration policy at a meeting in Brussels. This was reported by UNN with reference to France24 and Onet.pl.
Details
In the European Union, a number of countries are planning to approve a major legislative package on migration policy. As indicated, the migration and asylum pact is the result of many years of tense negotiations caused by the massive influx of illegal migrants in 2015, many of whom came from war-torn Syria and Afghanistan.
The European Union has been forced to share responsibility for the arrival of migrants, in particular due to criticism from charitable organizations and some nationalist governments, France24 reports.
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The reform pact aims to ease the burden on EU countries where most migrants arrive, provide a more efficient and fair legal framework for registering and processing asylum claims, and reduce secondary movements of migrants.
The pact, among other things, requires EU countries to accept thousands of asylum seekers from frontline states. Or - if they refuse - to provide money or other resources to countries under pressure.
Supporters of the pact have been working hard to get it to the finish line ahead of the European elections in June 2024. The measures are due to enter into force in 2026, after the European Commission determines how they will be implemented.
The EU is stepping up the use of agreements with countries of transit and origin aimed at limiting the number of incoming migrants.
Along with the radical reforms, the country has signed agreements with Tunisia, Mauritania, and Egypt. Italy has also signed an agreement with Albania to send migrants rescued in Italian waters to that country while their asylum applications are being considered.
A group of countries led by Denmark and the Czech Republic signed an agreement to provide asylum to migrants rescued in Italian waters.
Addendum
In Poland, the PiS government has discussed elements that do not take into account the specifics of countries, in particular: bordering Belarus. This was stated by Finance Minister Andrzej Domanski before the vote on the migration pact in the Council of the European Union.
The government's position is consistent and unequivocal. We have consistently opposed elements of the migration pact negotiated by the Law and Justice government. In our opinion, it does not take into account the specifics of countries bordering, for example, Belarus, countries that are facing growing pressure from the so-called hybrid war. The provisions of the Migration Pact do not properly take into account the relationship between responsibility and solidarity. The Law and Justice government has spoiled almost everything that could be spoiled in these negotiations, Polish Finance Minister Andrzej Domanski said in Brussels.
