EU lawmakers have backed a fresh tightening of the bloc’s asylum rules, endorsing measures that would accelerate the rejection of some claims and expand the circumstances in which applicants can be removed to countries outside the European Union.
On Tuesday, the European Parliament approved amendments to the Asylum Procedures Regulation that would establish an EU-wide list of “safe countries of origin” and widen the use of “safe third country” concepts in asylum processing. The text still requires final formal approval by the 27 member states before it can be adopted.
The vote comes as migration remains one of the EU’s most politically charged issues, with pressure on governments to speed up decisions and increase returns, and as nationalist and far-right parties continue to make electoral gains across parts of the bloc. The legislative direction follows a decade of policy hardening since the 2015–16 surge in arrivals, when more than one million people, many fleeing Syria, entered Europe via the Mediterranean and the Balkans.
What the Parliament approved
The Parliament’s changes aim to make asylum procedures faster by creating common EU tools for handling claims from applicants deemed unlikely to qualify for protection.
A central element is a first common EU list of “safe countries of origin”. Under the approach outlined by the Parliament, claims from nationals of listed countries can be channelled into accelerated procedures, on the presumption that applicants are generally not in need of international protection. According to the Parliament’s own agenda note ahead of the vote, the proposed list includes Bangladesh, Colombia, Egypt, India, Kosovo, Morocco and Tunisia, alongside EU candidate countries, subject to exceptions.
The measures also reinforce “safe third country” provisions, under which an application may be rejected if the applicant could have obtained protection in a country the EU considers safe. In practice, this can mean a member state treating an asylum claim as inadmissible and seeking to transfer the person to a non-EU country, provided the legal conditions are met.
Supporters argue that common lists and faster procedures reduce backlogs, deter unfounded claims, and limit secondary movements between member states by making outcomes quicker and more predictable. Critics counter that safety determinations are contested, and that fast-track systems risk weaker scrutiny of individual circumstances.
“Return hubs” and the Albania model
The vote is also seen in Brussels as another step towards enabling arrangements in which some asylum processing and returns-related steps happen outside EU territory.
The Reuters report on the vote said the changes move policy closer to allowing member states to set up “return hubs” outside the EU, similar in concept to Italy’s arrangements with Albania, while noting that specific rules on returns remain under discussion.
Italy’s deal with Albania has become a reference point in the EU debate about externalising parts of migration management. Under that framework, people intercepted near Italian waters can be transferred to Albania for processing, though legal challenges and practical constraints have continued to shape its implementation and scope.
Separately, the European Commission has pushed for a broader “European System for Returns”, arguing that the EU’s return rate for rejected asylum seekers remains low. Associated Press has previously cited a figure of around 20 per cent for returns, in reporting on Commission proposals that include “return hubs” in third countries.
Human rights criticism and political divisions
Humanitarian organisations and some lawmakers warned that the revised rules could weaken safeguards and raise the risk of unlawful returns.
Amnesty International said the Parliament’s vote could lead to asylum applications being rejected without full review, and that people could be sent to countries with which they have “no connection” and where they may never have been. Amnesty described the measures as paving the way for “offshore processing” agreements with third countries.
Concerns have also focused on the inclusion of countries such as Egypt and Tunisia in lists associated with “safe” designations, given scrutiny of their human rights records. The core legal question is whether safety presumptions can be applied while still ensuring an individual assessment and access to remedies, consistent with EU law and the principle of non-refoulement under the 1951 Refugee Convention.
Within the Parliament, French Green MEP Mélissa Camara criticised the direction of travel, arguing that designating third countries as safe despite serious rights concerns could put large numbers of people at risk.
How this fits into the wider EU migration overhaul
The amendments sit alongside the EU’s wider Pact on Migration and Asylum, a package of reforms intended to standardise procedures, strengthen border processes and introduce new solidarity mechanisms among member states. The pact was agreed in 2023 and is due to be fully implemented in June 2026, making timing politically significant as governments seek to show results on migration before and after national elections.
If member states give final approval, the new tools would give national authorities greater scope to accelerate certain cases and remove people to countries designated as safe under EU criteria. Opponents are likely to continue testing the system through litigation in national courts and the EU’s judicial framework, particularly where removals intersect with contested human rights conditions or weak personal links to the receiving country.
