Justice and Home Affairs Council of 6 and 7 December 2012
The Justice and Home Affairs Council, including the Belgian Ministers Joëlle Milquet and Annemie Turtelboom, and State Secretary Maggie De Block, met on 6 and 7 December 2012. The ministers also discussed issues concerning Immigration and Asylum.
The Home affairs ministers discussed the mid-term review of the Stockholm programme, which establishes the strategic guidelines for the period 2010-2014 in the area of freedom, security and justice.
They also took note of the state of play regarding the establishment of a Common European asylum system (CEAS), in particular with reference to the directive on asylum procedures, the regulation on "Eurodac" (a fingerprint database) and the Dublin regulation.
- On the asylum procedures directive, further progress has been made in negotiations with the European Parliament with a view to reaching agreement before the end of the year. On 27 November the Committee of Permanent Representatives (Coreper) adopted a revised compromise package. Negotiations are now in their end phase and agreement is sought before the end of this year.
- Concerning the Eurodac regulation, the Council adopted in October its position in view of the negotiations with the European Parliament. Trilogues are expected to start in the coming days, as soon as the Parliament adopts its position on this legislative text.
- Concerning the Dublin regulation, the Council adopted the political agreement reached with the European Parliament. The new regulation will introduce a mechanism for early warning, preparedness and crisis management. This mechanism is aimed at evaluating the practical functioning of national asylum systems, assisting member states in need and preventing asylum crises. The mechanism would concentrate on adopting measures to prevent asylum crises from developing rather than addressing the consequences of such crises once they had occurred.
Further on, the Council took note of the second and final report on the implementation of the Action Oriented Paper on strengthening the EU external dimension on action against trafficking in human beings.
In the margins of the Council meeting, the Mixed Committee (the EU plus Norway, Iceland,
Liechtenstein and Switzerland) discussed among others issues as SIS II and Schengen Governance.
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