The Dublin Regulation and the Syrian Refugee Crisis

Introduction
In this paper I will be exploring a key piece of European legislature, the
Dublin Regulation, which I will analyze to see how it affects the pressing
humanitarian issue of the Syrian Refugee Crisis. The question posed in this
paper is: what is the role of the Dublin Regulation in the European
treatment of Syrian asylum seekers? I will attempt to answer this question
in four part. The first is a brief history of the European Asylum System and
details of the Dublin Regulation which is then followed by a literature review
of consequences of the Dublin Regulation, focusing on asylum reception
conditions in Malta and patterns of secondary migration of Algerian and
Eritrean refugees in Europe. This literature will be used in the next part of
my paper to analyze the contemporary Syrian Refugee Crisis and how the
Dublin Regulation affects the treatment of Syrian asylum seekers. I will
conclude with potential solutions to the problems posed by the Dublin
Regulation.
The European Asylum System and the Dublin Regulation
Ever since the start of the European project in 1985, the EU has struggled
with treating refugees and asylum seekers in a consistent manner (History
of CEAS, 2015). Attempts to address these inconsistencies, both real and
perceived, were made through numerous pieces of legislation with the

ultimate goal for the harmonization of the EUs reception system for asylum
seekers (Jan-Paul Brekke, 2014, p. 145). The Common European Asylum
System (CEAS) was created to bridge national differences in reception
conditions, integration assistance and social rights so that it does not
matter which country you flee to (Ibid, p. 146).
Central to the CEAS is the Dublin Regulation which requires a Member
State to be responsible for a particular asylum seeker if the Member State is
the country of first entry for that person (Nicholas De Blouw, 2010, p. 339).
The Dublin Regulation tries to prevent what is described as asylum
shopping which is secondary migration within the EU for reasons such as
relaxed asylum laws and greater social welfare benefits (Ibid, p. 339). This is
done by the transfer system which allows the deportation of refugees back
to their original Member State in the case that they migrate to another
Member State. It purports to provide a common immigration arrangement
which should require all Member States to offer immigrants uniform
services and refugee claim evaluation on arrival (Ibid, p. 340). Another
goal of the Dublin Regulation is to prevent applications to multiple Member
States from individual asylum seekers in order to simplify the administrative
process (Dublin Regulation, 2015).

The Unintended Consequences of the Dublin Regulation

Despite the well-intentioned supranational objectives of the Dublin

Regulation, it has received severe criticisms for the problems it creates,
which are both efficiency based and humanitarian in nature. The regulation
assumes uniform laws and practices of participating states that are based on
common standards and that all Member States are equal with respect to the
resources available to aid refugees and asylum seekers (De Blouw, p. 340).
However in reality there are significant differences in immigration procedures
among Member States which lead to human rights violation and overflow
problems. A large part of the problem is that the Dublin Regulation puts
responsibility on the country of entry thus placing an unfair burden on
peripheral states such as Malta, Italy, Greece and Hungary.
This problem is particularly significant in the islands of Malta which is
one of the densest and most urban population centers in the world, with
400,000 people who live in the space of 122 square miles (Ibid, p. 345). In
fact, the impact of one immigrant to the population of Malta is roughly a
thousand times as much as the impact would be to Italy or Germany (Ibid,
p. 345). However, due to Maltas proximity to North Africa it receives a
disproportionately large number of refugees, with 4.9 asylum requests per
1000 inhabitants compared to the average European rate of 0.6 (The Dublin
Regulation: A Critical Examination Of a Troubled System , 2013). Since the
Dublin Regulation places the responsibility for North African asylum seekers
who enter through Malta on the Maltese government, the Maltese

government fails to meet its humanitarian obligations and in addition to that

commits human rights violations. For example due to the scarcity of
resources in Malta to take in refugees, Malta has a detention policy to limit
the effect the immigrants have on the country, and the increasingly
common policy for the Maltese government has been detention followed by
repatriation (De Bluow, pps.347-349). In addition to this, the conditions of
the detention centers fall well below normal decency standards; THE
detention centers were not built to hold people but to hold equipment (Ibid,
p. 350). These detention centers are guarded by trained military personnel
and the way these guards treat prisoners is shrouded in secrecy; all of this
has drawn complaints from the United Nations Human Rights Commission
(Ibid, pps. 349-351).
While the Dublin Regulation intended to streamline the process for
asylum status by only allowing an asylum seeker to apply to only one
Member State, the reality is that most asylum seekers are not aware of the
Dublin Regulation and nonetheless apply to multiples states. The result is
massive delays in the review of applications and in some cases applications
never get reviewed (Dublin Regulation, 2015)
Furthermore, the Dublin Regulation makes the assumption that
secondary migration within the European Union takes place because of
asylum shopping by refugees as discussed before. However research done
on secondary migration by Algerian and Eritrean refugees has shown that

most refugees seeking to migrate to a second country within the EU are not
motivated by rational factors like social welfare but are rather motivated by
family and cultural relationships, the role of smugglers and shared history
between the country of origin and the asylum state (Collyer, 2004) (Jan-Paul
Brekke, 2013). Despite this the Dublin Regulation is still in effect and forces
asylum seekers to reside in overburdened periphery states like Italy and
Malta despite those states having no connection to the said asylum seeker.
This harms both the asylum seeker and the Member state as the asylum
seeker is stuck in a country he/she does not want to live in and the Member
State has to take care of even more asylum seekers even though it does not
have the resources to do so.
The Syrian Crisis
Europe is currently facing its largest refugee crisis since World War 2
due to the Syrian Civil War with over 625,000 asylum applications being
made to European Countries in 2014 alone, a number which is even higher
for 2015 (Data Raises Questions over EUs attitude towards asylum
seekers, 2015). A large number of these refugees enter the Schengen area
through Greece, Hungary and Italy; these member states do not have the
resources to take responsibility for Syrian asylum seekers which the Dublin
Regulation gives since they are frequently the Member State of Entry
(Syrian Refugees in the EU, 2013). Hungary is notably the most affected
by the Syrian Refugee Crisis and has the highest number of Syrian asylum

applicants in the EU (Asylum Quarterly Report, 2015) and is taking

measures to prevent Syrian asylum seekers from entering its borders. For
example it has built a three meter tall razor fence on its border with Bulgaria
which has left thousands of refugees stranded (Refugee Crisis: thousands
left stranded with way into Hungary blocked by razor fence, 2015). This is
problematic in numerous ways and violates fundamental international and
European law regarding the treatment of refugees and non-refoulement.
Furthermore the Dublin Regulation is inhibiting secondary migration by
Syrian asylum seekers, thus making it difficult for them to relocate to a more
hospitable Northern country like Norway or the UK which are in a better
position to accept asylum seekers compared to Greece or Hungary. The
Syrian Crisis calls for a massive revamp of the Dublin Regulation since it is
leading to the denial of Syrian refugees with asylum status thus constituting
a grave humanitarian violation.
What now? Potential Solutions to the Dublin Regulation
Numerous modifications to the Dublin Regulation have been suggested
in literature. De Blouw suggests that it should be amended to: 1) to address
detention policies which negatively affect asylum seekers rights since they
dont have legal representation to successfully apply for asylum, and it
places asylum seekers at risk to psychological harm; 2) focus on a more
supranational system of burden sharing that involves cooperation between
Member States so that periphery states do not face an unfair burden from

refugee crises (pps. 365-367). Additionally, the transfer system in the Dublin
Regulation, which allows for a refugee to be deported within the EU to the
country of first entry is highly problematic and should be redacted since it
undermines the well-being of refugees as well as the supranational goals of
the EU; it is so egregious to the extent that it is has been challenged in
numerous courts within Europe on humanitarian grounds (Dublin
Regulation, 2015). Broader changes to the CEAS should also be made so
that periphery states are better compensated financially for dealing with a
larger share of the influx of asylum seekers. This should hopefully improve
reception standards as well as increase the number of accepted asylum
seekers since monetary incentives would be at play. With no end in sight for
the Syrian Refugee Crisis, and with Syrian asylum seekers being refused
entry by Member States like Hungary, there is no more important time for
the European Union to amend the Dublin Regulation and the CEAS.

Bibliography
The Independent. The Independent. Independent Digital News and Media, n.d. Web. 3 Dec.
2015. <http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/refugee-crisis-thousands-leftstranded-with-the-way-into-hungary-blocked-by-razor-wire-10502727.html>
Asylum Quarterly Report. - Statistics Explained. Web. 3 Dec. 2015.
<http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php/asylum_quarterly_report>
Collyer, M. The Dublin Regulation, Influences On Asylum Destinations and the Exception of

Algerians in the UK. Journal of Refugee Studies 17.4 (2004): 375400.

Data Raises Questions over EU's Attitude towards Asylum Seekers. euronews Data raises
questions over EU's attitude towards asylum seekers. Web. 3 Dec. 2015.
<http://m.euronews.com/en/304485/>
Dublin Regulation - European Council On Refugees and Exiles. Dublin Regulation European Council on Refugees and Exiles. Web. 3 Dec. 2015.
<http://www.ecre.org/topics/areas-of-work/protection-in-europe/10-dublinregulation.html>
The Dublin Regulation: A Critical Examination Of a Troubled System.
internationalrefugeelaw. N.p., 2013. Web. 3 Dec. 2015.
<https://internationalrefugeelaw.wordpress.com/2013/08/26/the-dublin-regulation-acritical-examination-of-a-troubled-system/>
History Of CEAS - European Council on Refugees and Exiles. History of CEAS - European
Council on Refugees and Exiles. Web. 3 Dec. 2015. <http://www.ecre.org/topics/areas-ofwork/introduction/194.html>
INFOGRAPHIC: Syrian Refugees in the EU. INFOGRAPHIC: Syrian refugees in the EU.
Web. 3 Dec. 2015. <http://www.trust.org/item/20131218221545-grmeu/?source=dpagerel>