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EU: Council plans to "map" security checks on refugees, migrants and EU citizens at external borders on all availablel databases

01 March 2017

EU  
Council plans to "map" security checks on refugees, migrants and EU citizens at external borders on all available databases
12-10.3.17
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The Council Presidency is preparing to launch a "mapping exercise" on all movements in and out of the EU at its external borders and also internally ("police checks"). See Note to: Standing Committee on Operational Cooperation on Internal Security (COSI): Security checks in case of irregular immigration - mapping exercise (LIMITE doc no: 6717-17, pdf)

For both all "third country nationals" including refugees and migrants and EU citizens the legal basis for carrying out "security checks" is:

"verification that the person concerned is not likely to jeopardise the public policy, internal security, public health or international relations of any of the Member States. Such verification shall include direct consultation of the SIS and other relevant Union databases, without prejudice to the consultation of national and Interpol databases."

Checks will be carried out at and outside "designated border crossing points" and:

"a person who has illegally crossed a border and who has no right to stay, shall be apprehended and be subject to the return Directive procedures."

Police checks

Under the Schengen Border Code (SBC):

"Member States may also temporarily reintroduce border controls at internal borders, if there is a serious threat to their public policy or internal security. In such a case, they may conduct border checks, including security checks, provided for in the SBC. If security checks regarding persons who have crossed the border illegally are carried out on the basis of spot-checks within the territory of the Member States, and which do not have border control as an objective, these are not border checks but police checks performed under the national law (cf. Article 23 SBC)."

"Hotspots"

At "hotspots" in Greece and Italy:

""access should be provided to the relevant databases SIS, EU VIS, Eurodac, Interpol databases and Europol databases, in particular to facilitate information exchange on security concerns in relocation cases including exchange of fingerprints before relocation".

And:

"When faced with hundreds, if not thousands, of arrivals and/or rescues per day, Member State authorities are confronted with complex security challenges. Illegal border-crossings outside designated border-crossing points take place between authorised border crossing points and are often undocumented, which means that it is impossible to run a check against any security database unless biometrics are utilised. However, today, only the VIS and Eurodac are fully biometric databases."

And further:

"The 'hotspot approach' also demonstrates that effective security checks necessitate the systematic use of biometrics in order to deal with large flows and conduct ‘security checks’ as early as possible after arrival. Member States should ensure that such ‘security checks’ are uniformly replicated all along the external borders of the EU. The aim is to replicate the good practices that Member States could already have in place regarding the use of biometrics and to agree on a common standard as to which databases are consulted."

A biometric "gap"

There is currently a:

"gap between Interpol databases and the US SRTP (Secure Real-Time Platform), which enables the automatic comparison of fingerprints against US data, including battlefield data from Syria and Iraq and other conflict zones. The US offer to provide Member States with access to this data could bridge the gaps, by providing access an additional database against which irregular migrants can be checked."

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Keep in touch: Statewatch Observatory: Refugee crisis in the Med and inside the EU: Daily news (updated through the day), commentaries and official documents

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