Roundtable "Asylum in Europe: Implications of the New Pact on Migration and Asylum and the European Parliament elections"

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Attend in person (please register) or online: https://youtube.com/live/RfpFL2pLpFc

To register please contact recke@mmg.mpg.de.

The European Union’s New Pact on Migration and Asylum is a long-awaited answer to the refugee problem to some – and a disastrous demolition of refugee rights to others. Its supporters presented the Pact as a historical agreement that comes to address long-standing shortcomings and imbalances in terms of solidarity and responsibility sharing. In the words of responsible EU-Commissioner Ylva Johansson, the priority now is “Implementation, implementation, implementation!”: a task that is largely in the hands of the Member States. A closer look at their track record in applying EU migration and asylum rules, however, reveals a blatant discrepancy between EU-level decisions and on-the-ground reality. Suffice it to recall the systemic breach of EU and international law at the external borders, the hotspot approach, the experience of Moria, or the Emergency Relocation Scheme of 2015 and its results. So, what should we expect from the New Pact? Are Member States going to work together in translating into practice the new rules and procedures? Are they going to respect the new mandatory solidarity mechanism and what will be the consequences? Ultimately, is the New Pact going to result in any meaningful changes in the reception and processing of asylum seekers in the EU - to the better or the worse? And has the Pact at least fulfilled the promise to pacify anti-immigrant voters and reduce the extreme Right vote in the EP-elections?

We will discuss the above questions from the perspective of both frontier and core Member States with the following speakers:

• Prof. Dr. Sabine Hess (University of Göttingen)
• Dr. Marcus Engler (Deutsches Zentrum für Integrations- und Migrationsforschung DeZIM)
• Dr. Michalis Moutselos (University of Cyprus & MPI-MMG)
• Dr. Tihomir Sabchev (Tilburg University & MPI-MMG)

Moderated by Dr. Tabea Scharrer (MPI-MMG).