Allocating to all member countries for those attempting to emigrate. Settlement and cost-sharing outline.
If crowds flock to a specific country, the EU will accept up to 30,000 people.
Expansion of biometric data collection information… History of potential security threats
The European Union (EU) announced on the morning of the 20th (local time) that after marathon all-night negotiations, it had reached an agreement on a ‘new framework on migration and asylum.’ It is predicted that with these changes, refugees and immigrants heading to Europe will experience higher barriers.
The negotiating parties were the European Parliament and the EU Council, which are legislative bodies, and the European Commission, which is the executive branch, also agreed. However, it must be ratified by each member state before it becomes law.
This agreement on EU refugee and immigrant legislation is receiving great attention. New rules on migration and asylum have been discussed for three years. This is because among the 27 member countries, Italy and Greece serve as ‘borders’, so most immigrants crossing the Mediterranean are concentrated in these two countries.
Both countries are experiencing major problems in the political, economic, and social fields due to refugee and immigrant issues. The new regulations believe that migrants attempting to cross the ‘border’ should be distributed and settled among all member states, and if there is no intention to settle them, equivalent economic costs must be paid. This was proposed three years ago, but only tedious discussions continued over the specific plan.
The gist of this agreement is that if the burden of accepting refugees and immigrants is concentrated on a specific country, up to 30,000 people should be accommodated separately. If you decide to repatriate them to their home country rather than accept them, you will have to pay EU funds of at least 20,000 euros (about 28.54 million won) per person.
It is assessed that the barriers to immigration to Europe have increased due to the ability to exercise veto in the form of donations.
In addition, it was decided to quickly filter out immigrants attempting to enter the country illegally through ‘borders’ limited to a few member countries. The goal is to ensure that problematic landfallers can no longer move into the EU. At the same time, the first screening of refugee and asylum applications will be completed within six months.
Shorter deadlines apply to applications that are clearly unfounded, inadmissible or at EU borders. The ‘fast border asylum procedure’, which can be applied for at the EU’s external border or transit point, must be reviewed within a maximum of 12 weeks, and those rejected must be sent back to their home country. Specifically, when there is a risk of harm to national security or public order, or when the applicant commits a deceptive act such as submitting false identity information, a person from a country with an asylum approval rate of less than 20% can apply for this procedure.
Under the new screening regulations, people who do not meet the EU entry requirements will undergo pre-entry screening procedures, including identity verification, biometric data collection, and health and security checks, for up to a week. Each member state will have an independent monitoring body to ensure respect for fundamental rights.
The plan is to reform ‘Eurodac’, their biometric information database, to more effectively identify people arriving on EU territory. For immigration applicants over the age of 6, nationality, age, fingerprints, and facial photos are collected. Authorities will be able to separately record personnel who may pose a security threat, such as being violent or illegally armed.
The European continent, including the EU, was swept by a huge ‘migrant wave’ in 2015 with more than 1 million people attempting to land.
The number of people attempting to emigrate and seeking asylum as refugees decreased after the EU gave a large amount of support to Turkiye and signed a crackdown and stay agreement. The number of people attempting to migrate, which had decreased to 225,000 in 2020 due to COVID-19, is showing a steep rise again, exceeding 350,000 this year.
As the Turkiye route was blocked, routes departing from North Africa such as Libya and Morocco to the central Mediterranean of Italy and Malta became successful again. This route is much more dangerous than the short eastern route from Turkiye to Greece. It is estimated that more than 2,500 people have already drowned in the Mediterranean Sea this year.
Since 2014, more than 28,000 people have drowned due to ship sinking while attempting to land in Europe.
As the number of people attempting to emigrate increases again, far-right parties advocating anti-immigration policies are making strides in elections in many European countries. Far-right parties are acting as an obstacle to European integration with their undemocratic platforms.
The migrant problem is becoming more serious in Germany, Italy, France, and the Netherlands. The establishment of hard-right right-wing governments in Hungary and Slovakia is also closely related to the immigration issue.
Source: Donga
Mark Jones is a world traveler and journalist for News Rebeat. With a curious mind and a love of adventure, Mark brings a unique perspective to the latest global events and provides in-depth and thought-provoking coverage of the world at large.