BRUSSELS: The Euro­pean Union was poised to agree new rules for how it handles asylum-seekers and irregular migrants after Germany said it would go along with the intensely-negotiated package.

EU home affairs commissioner Ylva Johansson said “no main obstacles” remain on the thorny issue after a meeting of the bloc’s interior ministers, and formal agreement would come “in a few days”.

Once implemented, the new Pact on Migration and Asylum would seek to relieve the pressure on so-called frontline countries such as Italy and Greece by relocating some arrivals to other EU states.

Those countries opposed to hosting asylum-seekers — Poland and Hungary among them — would be required to pay the ones that do take migrants in.

At the same time, the European Union will seek to speed up processing of asylum applications so that migrants deemed inadmissible are returned to their country of origin or of transit, and maximum detention times for migrants in border centres would be lengthened from the current 12 weeks.

German Interior Minis­ter Nancy Faeser said her country won concessions allowing it to finally back the deal, after initially abs­taining on an earlier draft it considered too harsh for some categories of migrants.

Only Poland and Hungary voiced opposition to the compromise text in the Brussels meeting, she said, so “we therefore assume that this political agreement is valid”.

‘Finishing line’

Changes made to get German assent included making sure families and children were “prioritised” when they arrived irregularly on EU soil and admission criteria for

asylum-seekers were not tightened, she said. Also, “the concept of instrumentalisation was defined more narrowly,” Faeser said.

Published in Dawn, September 29th, 2023