The new EU migration and asylum pact seeks to give governments a greater sense of control over their borders while bolstering the EU’s role in migration management – treating it as a European issue, not just a national one. “…Europeans will decide who comes to the EU and who can stay, not the smugglers,” European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen said.
The pact stipulates that rapid assessments of whether a person is eligible for asylum will take place at borders. It would make it harder for asylum-seekers to move on from the countries they arrive in. A so-called “solidarity mechanism”would see countries receiving fewer asylum-seekers helping countries like Greece and Italy that receive more – either by taking in some of their asylum-seekers, or offering those nations financial compensation.

To become law, the plan must in the coming months pass through the EU’s complex approval process. That is seen as highly likely. The deal, however, leaves several questions unresolved, like whether it will provide adequate protections for the right to claim asylum. It is vague on how it will make time-consuming procedures at the border go faster. And it does not detail how anyone who does not qualify for asylum will be deported. The EU lacks return agreements with many countries.
Human rights groups criticised the pact, saying it tramples several fundamental rights, including by forcing asylum seekers as young as six to provide biometric data. They also decried the decision to put more EU money into reinforcing borders with drones and cameras instead of toward saving lives.