CONFERENCE ON THE IMMIGRATION AND ASYLUM PACT

Javier Zarzalejos MEP participated on 29 October in a conference on the Immigration and Asylum Pact organised by the Spanish Commission for Refugee Aid (CEAR), together with Estrella Galán, Vice-President of the LIBE Committee of the European Parliament; Juan Fernando López Aguilar, member of the LIBE Committee of the European Parliament; Esther Pozo Vera, Head of the Migration and Asylum Unit of the European Commission and responsible for the Implementation Plans of the European Pact on Migration and Asylum; and Eleonora Testi, Legal Officer of the European Council on Refugees and Exiles (ECRE), moderated by Mauricio Valiente, Director General of CEAR.

of the European Pact on Migration and Asylum, and Eleonora Testi, Legal Officer of the European Council on Refugees and Exiles (ECRE), moderated by Mauricio Valiente, Director General of CEAR.

In a context of growing international instability and increasing migratory pressure, the Immigration and Asylum Pact has emerged as one of the main priorities on the European agenda. In his speech, Javier Zarzalejos highlighted the importance and challenges of this historic agreement, which is the result of an eight-year process of dialogue and consensus.

‘We are talking about a process of reflection and elaboration between institutions that has lasted eight years,’ he stressed. ‘This is not a matter of improvisation. This pact, which has been signed by leaders from Giorgia Meloni to Pedro Sanchez, has an important political value, demonstrating the consensus within the Union’.

The pact addresses complex border management issues and seeks a balance between security and guaranteeing rights. ‘We cannot accept an exclusionary dilemma between freedom and security,’ he said, stressing that the agreement is based on the need to “integrate immigration not only as a challenge, but as an asset in our societies”.

The European Parliament has been a key player in shaping the pact, exercising its role as co-legislator to strengthen the fundamental rights dimension. ‘We have left a good mark in terms of improvements related to the rights of unaccompanied minors, free legal aid and the creation of safeguards in border procedures,’ he said, recalling that independent monitoring mechanisms have been adopted to ensure a fair implementation of the pact.

To ensure that the implementation process is kept under control, the Parliament has set up a specific working group on the monitoring of the Immigration and Asylum Pact. ‘We agree with all groups on the need for the Parliament to strengthen its supervisory and monitoring role,’ Zarzalejos explained. This group, made up of representatives of all political parties, will play a key role in monitoring the national implementation plans that each Member State must submit by 12 December.

‘We hope that the commitment of states will be translated into concrete resources, because political priorities are measured in terms of spending decisions and allocation of resources,’ he said. He stressed that the pact does not simply seek to establish more restrictive migration policies, but ‘more effective and realistic policies, which respond to the growing need for management in an expanding migratory context’.

As for the technical challenges posed by the pact, he acknowledged that ‘there are problems that will have to be resolved along the way, but we firmly believe that this agreement is balanced, with the necessary guarantees on the table’. He also insisted that, in order to avoid ‘embarrassing and inexplicable’ situations, it will be crucial that member states provide the necessary resources for the effective implementation of the pact.