TREVI, EUROPOL & IMMIGRATION
01 January 1991
TREVI, EUROPOL & IMMIGRATION
artdoc January=1993
report on the EC Immigration/Trevi Ministers conference
which set out new asylum policies and heralded the end of the
Trevi Group
Introduction
The meeting of the EC Interior Ministers on 30 November - 1
December 1992 in London was, as usual, conducted in secret with
the press given selective briefings. The meetings of the 12
Interior Ministers (including the Home Secretary from the UK)
take place twice a year at end of each of the six-monthly
Presidency's of the EC. The Interior Ministers' meeting reports
to the following full EC Council meetings of Prime Ministers -
the latest being that in Edinburgh on 11-12 December chaired by
John Major.
Prior to the Interior Ministers meetings a whole series of
secret committees and working groups are held. During the British
Presidency (July-December 1992) there were over 60 such meetings
of officials, police, immigration, and customs officers, and
internal security services. Their meetings too are held in
secret, drafts discussed and amended, disputes resolved and their
reports in turn are reported to the Interior Ministers meeting
where their minutes are routinely ratified - only points of
contention are discussed by the Ministers. The European
Parliament and the 12 national parliaments have no opportunity
to discuss the documents prior to the meeting. The UK parliament
does not discuss the reports considered, partly because it is not
told what has been decided and partly because the procedure
followed allows for no debate. A `planted' written question
elicits a few anodyne lines in Hansard from the Home Secretary
reporting in the most general terms on the outcome of the
meetings.
At the meeting in London last year the first day, 30 November,
was spent on immigration and asylum policy, and on border
controls. The next morning, on 1 December, Trevi matters were
dealt with.
Immigration and asylum
The resolution on `manifestly unfounded' asylum applications,
reported in the last issue of Statewatch, was split into two
resolutions and a conclusion. The most contentious parts of the
draft's preamble, which referred to `economic migrants' and to
`intercontinental travel seldom being necessary for protection
reasons', have now mostly been cut. This followed a further
report in October expressing concern about the `presentational
impact' of the first draft prepared by the UK Presidency. But the
substance of the resolutions is the same: victims of human rights
abuses, torture, `disappearances' and all the horror of modern
civil war, are expected to seek sanctuary elsewhere in their own
country if possible, then to seek it in the first `safe' country
they pass through (or could have gone to). If any of these
conditions apply, or if the country they have fled from is deemed
`safe', their applications will not be considered substantively;
they will be declared `manifestly unfounded' and subjected to an
accelerated appeal procedure designed to get them out of Europe
within a month.
Applications will also be deemed manifestly unfounded if the
authorities believe they were `made to forestall expulsion', if
the applicant has failed to comply with, for example, a
fingerprinting request, or has destroyed or mutilated documents,
or has been rejected elsewhere, or expresses a desire for better
living conditions or a job, or there are other urgent reasons for
getting rid of the applicant, such as `serious public security
reasons'.
Two issues were left unresolved. The German Minister felt it
would be `helpful' to have an agreed list of `safe' countries,
other considered this would be controversial. Some countries
wanted a provision to be included that the removal of asylum
seekers to a third country considered `safe' should be dependent
on this country agreeing to accept them - this was turned down
because it would take too long.
The two resolutions and conclusion on a