Greece, Italy, Malta and Spain say that the new migration pact – as proposed by the European Commission – fails to do enough to systemically redistribute new migrants arriving in the southern EU member states. The four Mediterranean countries expressed their demands in a discussion paper seen by the German news agency dpa.
More than 1,500 migrants have illegally entered Germany from Scandinavian nations since the beginning of the year. Politicians are calling for an overhaul of the Dublin regulation to make such secondary migration less attractive.
The European Asylum Support Office (EASO) has published its latest analysis of the most recent asylum trends in Europe. In addition to COVID-19 related issues, EASO also highlighted a surge of asylum seekers coming to the EU from Belarus.
At a high-level conference on migration on November 19, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen underscored that Italy, Greece, and Spain are concerned that they do not have the capacity to deal with migration flows and that they need help from other European countries.
Notis Mitarakis, the Greek Minister of Migration and Asylum, has told InfoMigrants about plans to get tougher on migration, with closed camps, new asylum laws and tighter border controls. But he denied allegations of migrant pushbacks, saying Greece has acted within the law.
The European Commission will take legal action against Hungary once more following the country’s most recent transgression against EU-wide asylum standards. Brussels announced on Friday that it will initiate infringement proceedings shortly over Hungary's "incorrect application of EU asylum legislation."
Another flight bringing migrants, refugees and asylum seekers from Greece landed in the northern German city of Hanover on Thursday. A total of 66 people will be distributed across Germany, according to the German interior ministry.
EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and Italian Premier Giuseppe Conte have agreed that the EU and Italy will work together on EU migration reforms.
The European Union looks poised to find broad political agreement on a new EU migration pact. German Interior Minister Horst Seehofer said that the 27 member states might be able to adopt the new legislation before the end of the year.
Amnesty International in a new report said that thousands of Europe-bound migrants who were intercepted and returned to Libya were forcefully disappeared after being taken out of unofficial detention centers. Amnesty urged the EU to reconsider its cooperation with Libyan authorities.
Hungary's Viktor Orban, Poland's Mateusz Morawiecki and the Czech Republic's Andrej Babis shot down the EU's planned migration reform ahead of scheduled talks. The Visegrad group rejects asylum seeker quotas.
The European Commission plans to build new migrant reception facilities on Lesbos to be run together with Greece. Around 10,000 migrants from the destroyed Moria camp are currently being housed in a temporary tent facility on the island.