(Brussels) – The new European Union Migration and Asylum Pact ushers in sweeping changes that undermine the right to asylum, Human Rights Watch said today. Human Rights Watch released a question-and-answer document that explains the key changes to EU asylum laws and procedures and the risks for people’s rights. The Pact, adopted in 2024, comes into full effect on June 12, 2026.
“The new EU asylum pact, despite the trumpeting of EU leaders, slams the door in the face of people who deserve to be treated with dignity and to have a fair hearing of their claims for protection,” said Judith Sunderland, senior refugee and migrant rights advisor at Human Rights Watch. “The Pact takes a sledgehammer to the right to asylum at a time when the world needs Europe more than ever to champion human rights.”
The Pact is a set of 10 pieces of binding legislation overhauling how the EU manages its borders, processes asylum applications, and addresses responsibility-sharing among member states. The new rules make it easier for governments to rush decisions and limit safeguards in asylum processing, much of which will now take place under truncated “border procedures,” while increasing the use and the length of detention. A new Crisis Regulation allows EU countries to deny people the right to apply for asylum in vaguely defined situations of “mass influx” or “instrumentalization” of migration by third countries.
EU countries will now be able to reach agreements with “safe third countries” outside the EU willing to take asylum seekers. This means that an EU country can refuse to examine an asylum application and instead send the asylum seeker to a country where they may not have any cultural ties, family, or community, and where their prospects for support and integration could be in doubt. In practice, such arrangements have done more to deflect responsibility than ensure effective protection.
The changes do little to address dysfunctional relations among EU countries, leaving in place rules that put a disproportionate share of responsibility for asylum seekers on countries at the EU’s external borders. A new “solidarity mechanism” will allow states to refuse to relocate people from countries facing stress on their asylum system and instead pay for border fences, barbed wire, and surveillance.
The Pact also includes provisions that could, if prioritized and implemented properly, help identify migrants and asylum seekers with specific support requirements, including people with disabilities and people at heightened risk of abuse. EU countries are obligated to create independent mechanisms to monitor respect for human rights during border procedures.
EU countries should do everything they can within the constraints of the Pact to mitigate its worst consequences and ensure compliance with the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights, Human Rights Watch said. The authorities should limit the use of detention and asylum border procedures and ensure capacity to properly identify people with specific protection and support requirements and should stop diverting asylum seekers to countries with less capacity to provide effective protection. They should limit the Crisis Regulation to truly exceptional circumstances.
Independent monitoring mechanisms should have broad mandates to report on and investigate all allegations of rights violations in the context of border activities, with effective remedies available to all victims.
“Despite the Migration and Asylum Pact’s constricting new rules, EU countries still have options to do the right thing,” Sunderland said. “At a minimum, EU countries should limit the use of detention, identify and ensure support for people at heightened risk of abuse, and refrain from outsourcing asylum responsibilities to other countries.”
