The European Court of Justice grooms Greece on the treatment of asylum seekers

The Dublin II Regulation requires the state of first entry into the EU to collect requests but a judgment that clearly refers to Athens, establishes that an applicant cannot be put in another member state if there is risk “of suffering inhuman or degrading treatment”

A state may not reject an applicant for asylum and send him to another member state if it puts them at risk “of being subjected to inhuman or degrading treatment.” As laid down by a ruling of the EU Court of Justice which further explains the “Dublin II,” the EU regulation which sets out the criteria for determining the member state responsible for examining an asylum application presented in the Union. According to the Dublin II, the member state in which the non-EU citizen first puts his foot is competent, but often refugees who land on Italian, Spanish and especially Greek shores prefer to submit the application for protection in other countries, fearing that this will be rejected. Out of 11,195 requests in 2012 Athens actually responded with 11,095 or nearly 100% refusals.

The ruling came in response to the application of an Iranian citizen who illegally entered Germany via Greece. The request for asylum presented in Germany was declared inadmissible because, under the Regulation, Greece was the member state competent to examine it. The Iranian then appealed and the Administrative Court of Frankfurt am Main, given the conditions of treatment of asylum seekers and the processing of applications in Greece, ruled that Germany was required to consider the application and the German authorities subsequently gave him refugee status.

However the Court of Appeals has asked the EU Court to clarify how to identify the member state which is responsible for examining the application for asylum. In its judgment the Court reiterated that “a member state shall not transfer an asylum seeker to the member state initially identified as responsible when it cannot overlook that systemic deficiencies in the asylum procedure and reception conditions of asylum seekers in that member state are serious and substantiate reasons to believe that the applicant runs a real risk of being subjected to inhuman or degrading treatment.” The country then has the opportunity to either examine the request in person or “in such a situation they should choose not to” at least must “identify the competent member state”, but pointed out that the whole process should not last for an “unreasonable amount of time.”

The European Commission did not seem surprised at the ruling and has even said that “it is not the first judgment like this.” As explained to the press by Michele Cercone, spokesman for the Home Affairs Commissioner, Cecilia Malmström, the Brussels executive is “disturbed” and has already opened “an infringement procedure against the Greek authorities because of their lack of respect for implementation of the entire European legislation regarding asylum” and of “conditions for asylum.” And to overcome this situation, he explains, “in June we launched a joint action plan”, but it will be “difficult” and it will take time. What is most challenged by the EU Commission is the fact that asylum seekers in Greece are locked up “indiscriminately” in detention centers together with illegal immigrants.  “European legislation is clear,” continued Cercone, “it allows detention in extraordinary cases,” but for the rest of the refugees “they should not and cannot be put in detention centers.”

 Alfonso Bianchi