Turkey as a safe third country? - A study on the safe third country concept and its compliance with non-refoulement
(2017) LAGF03 20171Department of Law
Faculty of Law
- Abstract
- In 2016 the EU and Turkey reached an agreement with the goal to end “irregular migration” from Turkey to the EU. Under this agreement asylum seekers who have entered Greece via Turkey will have their asylum applications deemed as inadmissible on safe third country grounds and subsequently be returned to Turkey.
The purpose of this essay is to broaden the understanding of some of the obligations of EU member states when engaging in safe third country practices. Thus, this essay examines the criteria for applying the safe third country concept under EU law and the limitations of its implementation due to international law. To this end, the essay primarily employs a legal dogmatic method.
While most safe third country provisions in EU... (More) - In 2016 the EU and Turkey reached an agreement with the goal to end “irregular migration” from Turkey to the EU. Under this agreement asylum seekers who have entered Greece via Turkey will have their asylum applications deemed as inadmissible on safe third country grounds and subsequently be returned to Turkey.
The purpose of this essay is to broaden the understanding of some of the obligations of EU member states when engaging in safe third country practices. Thus, this essay examines the criteria for applying the safe third country concept under EU law and the limitations of its implementation due to international law. To this end, the essay primarily employs a legal dogmatic method.
While most safe third country provisions in EU asylum policy are uncontroversial, some are shown to be quite unclear and potentially leave the member states with a rather wide scope of interpretation. Keeping this in mind, the essay analyzes to what extent the implementation of the safe third country concept on Turkey is compatible with non-refoulement under the 1951 Geneva Convention.
The essay shows that the lack of a fair status determination in Turkey, potentially increases the risk for refoulement. However, asylum seekers returned from Greece to Turkey on safe third country grounds never get their asylum claims materially examined by Greek authorities. Therefore it is difficult to know how many asylum seekers Turkey has illegally expulsed to a country of persecution and to which extent Greece has been involved in indirect refoulement. (Less) - Abstract (Swedish)
- Under 2016 slöt EU och Turkiet en överenskommelse om att minska antalet ”irreguljära migranter” som tog sig från Turkiet vidare in i EU. Överenskommelsen innebär att asylsökande som tar sig in i Grekland via Turkiet kommer få sina ansökningar bedömda som ogrundade och återsändas till Turkiet på grunden att Turkiet är ett så kallat ”säkert tredjeland”.
Syftet med denna uppsats är att öka förståelsen av de förpliktelser som EU:s medlemsstater är bundna av när de tillämpar bestämmelser om säkra tredje länder. I uppsatsen undersöks de EU-rättsliga kriterierna för att tillämpa dessa bestämmelser samt vilka begränsningar som internationell rätt sätter på dess tillämpning. Undersökningarna företas huvudsakligen genom bruket av en... (More) - Under 2016 slöt EU och Turkiet en överenskommelse om att minska antalet ”irreguljära migranter” som tog sig från Turkiet vidare in i EU. Överenskommelsen innebär att asylsökande som tar sig in i Grekland via Turkiet kommer få sina ansökningar bedömda som ogrundade och återsändas till Turkiet på grunden att Turkiet är ett så kallat ”säkert tredjeland”.
Syftet med denna uppsats är att öka förståelsen av de förpliktelser som EU:s medlemsstater är bundna av när de tillämpar bestämmelser om säkra tredje länder. I uppsatsen undersöks de EU-rättsliga kriterierna för att tillämpa dessa bestämmelser samt vilka begränsningar som internationell rätt sätter på dess tillämpning. Undersökningarna företas huvudsakligen genom bruket av en rättsdogmatisk metod.
Medan majoriteten av bestämmelserna kring säkra tredje länder är okontroversiella, visar sig andra vara en aning diffusa, vilket potentiellt ger medlemsstaterna ett stort tolkningsutrymme vid tillämpandet av bestämmelserna. Därmed går uppsatsen över till att analysera i vilken utsträckning implementeringen av bestämmelserna kring säkra tredje länder på Turkiet är kompatibla med principen om non-refoulement under 1951 års Flyktingkonvention.
Uppsatsen visar på att Turkiets bristande asylprocess potentiellt ökar risken för refoulering. I och med att asylsökande som återförvisas från Grekland till Turkiet aldrig får sina skyddsbehov prövade i sak, är det svårt att fastställa hur många asylsökande som Turkiet felaktigen har utvisat till länder där de riskerar förföljelse. Därmed är det svårt att avgöra till vilken grad Grekland har gjort sig ansvarig till indirekt refoulering. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
http://lup.lub.lu.se/student-papers/record/8908411
- author
- Yenidogan, Deria Rumina LU
- supervisor
- organization
- course
- LAGF03 20171
- year
- 2017
- type
- M2 - Bachelor Degree
- subject
- keywords
- Public international law, Asylum, Safe Third Country, Turkey, European Union, Asylum Procedures Directive
- language
- English
- id
- 8908411
- date added to LUP
- 2017-06-30 12:56:41
- date last changed
- 2017-06-30 12:56:41
@misc{8908411,
abstract = {{In 2016 the EU and Turkey reached an agreement with the goal to end “irregular migration” from Turkey to the EU. Under this agreement asylum seekers who have entered Greece via Turkey will have their asylum applications deemed as inadmissible on safe third country grounds and subsequently be returned to Turkey.
The purpose of this essay is to broaden the understanding of some of the obligations of EU member states when engaging in safe third country practices. Thus, this essay examines the criteria for applying the safe third country concept under EU law and the limitations of its implementation due to international law. To this end, the essay primarily employs a legal dogmatic method.
While most safe third country provisions in EU asylum policy are uncontroversial, some are shown to be quite unclear and potentially leave the member states with a rather wide scope of interpretation. Keeping this in mind, the essay analyzes to what extent the implementation of the safe third country concept on Turkey is compatible with non-refoulement under the 1951 Geneva Convention.
The essay shows that the lack of a fair status determination in Turkey, potentially increases the risk for refoulement. However, asylum seekers returned from Greece to Turkey on safe third country grounds never get their asylum claims materially examined by Greek authorities. Therefore it is difficult to know how many asylum seekers Turkey has illegally expulsed to a country of persecution and to which extent Greece has been involved in indirect refoulement.}},
author = {{Yenidogan, Deria Rumina}},
language = {{eng}},
note = {{Student Paper}},
title = {{Turkey as a safe third country? - A study on the safe third country concept and its compliance with non-refoulement}},
year = {{2017}},
}