The European Union's interior ministers, during a meeting in Stockholm today, Thursday, expressed their desire to intensify the return of irregular migrants to their home countries, and some called for restricting the issuance of visas to citizens of "non-cooperating" countries.
"We see an increase in the number of irregular arrivals," said Swedish Immigration Minister Maria Malmer Stenergaard, whose country holds the rotating semi-annual presidency of the Council of the European Union. "The return of those whose asylum applications have been rejected to Europe is a very important issue."
For its part, the European Commission indicated, based on data from the European Statistical Agency (Eurostat), that out of about 340,500 "return" decisions - issued in 2021 in European countries - only 21% of them were implemented.
"We have a very low repatriation rate. We can make progress to increase the number and make it faster," said European Commissioner for Home Affairs Ylva Johansson upon her arrival at the meeting.
The mechanism to reduce the number of visas - at the European level - has been implemented since 2020 to push immigration-exporting countries to return their citizens against whom deportation decisions have been issued.
The Swedish Presidency of the Council of the European Union considers it "important to exploit the full potential of this mechanism" and stated in a preparatory document for the meeting that "there are some third countries for which action can be taken quickly to improve the level of cooperation that is currently insufficient."
France supports the use of this mechanism, as Minister of State for Citizenship Affairs Sonia Bakis said in Stockholm, "For us, there are two stages: a first during which constructive dialogue must be carried out with third countries, but restrictions must be tightened (in a second stage) if results are not achieved."
The implementation of the mechanism is also supported by Italy, whose Interior Minister Matteo Biantidossi stressed that “the return procedure linked to reintegration projects, including in the case of forced repatriation, can facilitate the cooperation of the foreign countries concerned, and encourage the home countries to strengthen cooperation and contribute to addressing the causes deep migration.
However, Germany expressed some "reservations" on this issue, and its interior minister, Nancy Wesser, said that she preferred to conclude immigration agreements, especially with North African countries, "that provide, on the one hand, legal channels for immigration, and on the other hand, effective repatriation."
It is noteworthy that the Gambia is the only country that is subject to European sanctions against the background of "non-cooperation", and the conditions for granting a Schengen visa to citizens of the country have been tightened, and its fees have increased to 120 euros (compared to 80 euros on average).
In 2021, the Commission proposed visa restrictions against Iraq and Bangladesh, and Johansson - who visited Dhaka last November - said that the threat of sanctions prompted Bangladesh to cooperate.
For their part, the heads of state and government of the European Union called in December 2021 for "the use of all relevant European tools, including development aid, trade and visas" as leverage in the immigration file.
Almost 8 years after the refugee crisis in 2015, the EU countries are still unable to reform their asylum systems, but the number of immigrants is on the rise. After years during which immigration declined as a result of restrictions on movement related to the Covid epidemic, 330,000 entries were recorded. irregular" in 2022, the highest level since 2016.