EU restricts Schengen visas to 13 countries
These countries are on the list prepared by the European Commission, according to the German newspaper Volt am Sonntag. The 13 countries are obliged by international law to take back their rejected asylum seekers; But they don’t do it “right.”
In February, EU Home Affairs Commissioner Ylva Johansson released a report on cooperation with 39 non-member countries in returning and accepting rejected asylum seekers. Cooperation with more than a third of the countries surveyed needs to be improved, he said. The EU Commission did not name a specific country; Because this report is confidential.
The rate of deportation of migrants to non-member countries by the EU has been at a low level for years. “We are starting talks with a limited number of non-member states,” Johansson said after a meeting of EU interior ministers in mid-March.
He said he was ready to make proposals by the summer to impose restrictions on visas to these countries if the talks did not progress sufficiently. An EU Commission spokesman on Sunday confirmed the possibility of such measures.
The EU, under visa rules that came into force in February 2020, can use the possibility of issuing visas to pressure non-member countries that do not cooperate in accepting rejected asylum seekers.
The EU Commission now wants to “enter into talks” with Iraq, #Iran, Libya, Senegal, Somalia, Mali, Gambia, Cameroon, the Republic of the Congo, Egypt, Eritrea, Ethiopia and Guinea-Bissau.
Accordingly, if cooperation with these countries does not improve, EU member states may impose some restrictions on visa issuance to citizens of these countries from the summer.
These restrictions include, in the first place, the abolition of the 15-day deadline for processing visa applications or the suspension of free visas for diplomats. In the second step, there is a possibility of increasing the visa fee from 80 to 160 euros.