a) New pre-screening and border procedures: the need to guarantee safeguards and a fair process

Before getting on the boat, I decided not to look at the water. If you look at the sea before getting on the boat you can’t get on. I imagined that I was crossing a small river in Africa.” Audrey, 32-year old woman from Cameroon. Moria camp, Lesvos island, Greece. September 2020.

The EU’s recognition that Europe can no longer allow people to languish for months, sometimes years, awaiting a decision on their asylum application, is essential and welcome. However, the new European Commission proposals on compulsory pre-entry screening100 and border procedures, raise serious questions about safeguarding and the fair assessment of individual protection claims. These proposals include the increased use of accelerated border procedures where decisions applicants. Proposing that member states should issue an asylum and return decision simultaneously risks undermining international legal obligations.101 It ignores important safeguards relating to non-refoulement, the best interests of the child, and the protection of family and private life. Many also fear that the new approach could result in more people being held for more time, in more locations, including beyond the EU’s physical territory.102 is to speed up asylum procedures, but there is little to suggest how this will be achieved, beyond the reduction of safeguards and introducing a system of triage. In the new border procedure, asylum-seekers103 will be treated as if they are not yet on EU territory. They will be

are made within 12 weeks, and swift returns for failed screened and undergo an asylum procedure. If rejected, the return procedure will take effect with short time-limits and limited safeguards, within what are likely to be closed centres. This carries risks not only to fundamental rights but also to people’s wellbeing. In addition, the process proposed may not be realistic. The length and fairness of border procedures will largely depend on the national capacities of immigration authorities, lawyers and judges, which vary significantly across EU member states.

Rather than offering a more fair and timely asylum process, the new proposals for expedited procedures risk exacerbating, rather than alleviating, the stress and suffering that people experience. As this report has detailed, the people the IRC works with already face significant uncertainties under the current asylum process regarding their rights and prospects. Limited and ad hoc access to legal aid already provokes great anxiety for those seeking international protection. The suggestion in the new proposals that those undergoing pre-entry screening may not have any access to a lawyer