(Series Information) European Papers - A Journal on Law and Integration, 2023 8(2), 985-1011 | Article | (Table of Contents) I. Introduction. – II. The establishment of the European Border and Coast ...Guard. – III. The enhancement of the Agency’s mandate. – III.1. The conferral of executive powers on the Agency’s staff. - III.2. The emergence of a supervisory role. – IV. Cooperation with third countries in the framework of the European Border and Coast Guard Regulation. – V. The implications of the extraterritorial Frontex joint operations. – V.1. The deployment of border management teams on the territory of third countries. – V.2. The delimitation of responsibilities between the actors involved in the operations. – V.3. Redress in case of fundamental rights breaches. – VI. Conclusions. | (Abstract) The aim of this Article is to examine the role played by Frontex in the process of externalisation of EU migration policies. It is not surprising that the external dimension of Frontex’s powers has been reinforced in the successive reforms of its legal framework. There is a common agreement between Member States on the need to intensify international cooperation with third countries in order to face current challenges in the area of migration. The deployment of border management teams on the territory of third countries raises complex legal and political questions as regards the legal regimen applicable and the delimitation of responsibilities between the different actors involved in the extraterritorial operations. The allegations of fundamental rights violations in which Frontex was reportedly involved in the Aegean Sea show that it will be very difficult to clarify the role of Frontex in any wrongdoing that will happen in the context of operations implemented on the territory of third countries.
(Series Information) European Papers - A Journal on Law and Integration, 2023 8(2), 959-984 | Article | (Table of Contents) I. Introduction. – II. Background: setting CFSP/CSDP missions on migration. ...– III. CFSP/CSDP missions versus AFSJ instruments. – III.1. Competence question. – III.2. Institutional implications for decision–making procedures. – III.3. ECJ competences and judicial protection. – IV. The ECJ doctrine on the choice of the appropriate legal basis and the delimitation between CFSP and migration policy. – IV.1. Revisiting the ECJ doctrine on the choice of the appropriate legal basis. – IV.2. Applying the ECJ doctrine to CFSP/CSDP missions on migration. – IV.3. Alternatives to the “centre of gravity test”. – V. Conclusion. | (Abstract) The response of the EU’s external action to migration challenges is not limited to the use of its migration competences under Title V TFEU, but also extends to CFSP/CSDP instruments, governed by the TEU. As a further illustration of the securitisation approach evidenced in the EU’s management of migration, the Union deploys CSDP missions with components and objectives related to strengthening border controls, fighting human trafficking and migrant smuggling, and promoting third countries’ capacity-building in these purposes areas. Using CSDP instruments, mainly foreseen to preserve international security, for migration purposes touches upon the horizontal demarcation of EU competences and raises an essential question related to the choice of the correct legal basis in cross-Treaty cases, at a time in which the CFSP still presents some intergovernmental features. This Article firstly reviews the legal implications of the recourse to the CFSP instead of AFSJ instruments for migration purposes, addressing and comparing the competence question, decision-making and judicial protection in both policies. This shows how the increasing “normalisation” of the CFSP does not match yet the degree of integration of the AFSJ and its corresponding safeguards. Secondly, the ECJ doctrine on the choice of the appropriate legal basis and its “centre of gravity test” is revisited to clarify how its criteria apply to the linkages between CFSP and migration policy. Although a simultaneity of inextricably linked objectives complicates this cross-Treaty delimitation, a strict application of the “centre of gravity test”, by which a CFSP tool is instrumentalised to pursue an AFSJ objective, may provide the answer to this controversy
En materia de seguridad y defensa, Ceuta y Melilla no aparecen como territorios cubiertos por la cláusula de legítima defensa de la OTAN, si bien serían susceptibles de ser objeto de consultas ente ...las partes ante un peligro para la integridad, independencia o seguridad de cualquiera de ellos. No obstante, Ceuta y Melilla sí estarían cubiertas por la cláusula de legítima defensa colectiva recogida en el art. 42.7 TUE. Esto último debería manifestarse de forma clara en la Estrategia de Seguridad Nacional del Reino de España, además de dotarle de una dimensión europea a través de los mecanismos previstos en la Política Común de Seguridad y Defensa. En cuanto a la seguridad interior, el futuro Plan Integral de Seguridad para Ceuta y Melilla, basándose en la normativa de Frontex, debe establecer planes operativos, de contingencia y de desarrollo de capacidades, y de acuerdo con la futura Estrategia Nacional de Gestión de Fronteras.
The Southern Mediterranean border has in the past decade become one of the most deeply contested political spaces in Europe and has been described as a site of the border spectacle. Drawing on ...textual and visual analysis of Twitter messages by two of the most prominent actors in the field, the European Border and Coast Guard Agency, Frontex, and the humanitarian and medical NGO Médecins Sans Frontières, the article examines the split nature of the Mediterranean border which is, among others, visible in radically different narratives about migrants’ journeys, border deaths and living conditions. The findings challenge previous scholarship about convergence of humanitarianism and policing. The two actors are waging a fierce media battle for moral authority, where they use widely diverging strategies of claiming authority, each of which carries a particular set of ethical dilemmas.
The malfunctioning of the Common European Asylum System can be traced back to the principle of responsibility established by the Dublin regime. To attenuate its problems, the EU has delegated ...regulatory competences to Frontex and the European Asylum Support Office (EASO), which have been given a ‘right to intervene’ in those Member States that put the system at risk. This article expands Majone's typologies of agents and trustees to explain why and how power has been delegated and the resulting consequences. It includes cases of failed delegation and argues that, although Frontex and EASO should operate as trustees – to prevent co‐operation from breaking down – they have not been provided with enough autonomy, which exposes them to capture by particular interests. The reforms show that EU agencies are likely to be used as proxies by a group of strong Member States to monitor and intervene in weaker Member States.
Crisis-driven EU policy in recent years fits within a securitisation narrative, in which the claim of public security threat outweighs fundamental rights and their accountability safeguards. Under ...this policy development, Frontex, the EU Border and Coast Guard Agency, has experienced an impressive expansion in its powers and competences, without the equivalent enhancement of accountability safeguards. This article focuses in particular on the issue of transparency as a fundamental right and an element of social and political accountability. Specifically, it examines how lack of transparency in complex multi-actor structures, such as Frontex joint operations, can result in gaps in accountability and impact the enforcement of basic fundamental rights of EU citizens and migrants. Using a conceptual perspective of accountability and securitisation, and highlighting specific gaps in transparency in the context of Frontex joint operations, this article aims to show how the lack of transparency has been determined by the situation of emergency and has continued to remain unaddressed due to a constant state of institutional emergency, feeding back into the perpetuation of the securitisation narrative.
Frontex has been heavily criticized for disregarding fundamental rights in its border management from the outset. To address this critique, the EU legislators established a Consultative Forum on ...fundamental rights to provide independent advice in fundamental rights matters. Despite the importance of this issue, little effort has been made to study the role and impact of the Consultative Forum. Addressing this research gap, this Article seeks to answer whether the Consultative Forum has improved Frontex's fundamental rights accountability. Theoretically, we will combine the concept of accountability elaborated by Bovens and the notion of dialogues, allowing us to assess the interaction of the Consultative Forum with the various fora which are supposed to hold Frontex to account. As a special form of communication, dialogues focus on the giving and taking of various sorts including information, arguments and justifications. We argue that the status of the Forum and its possibility to engage with internal and external stakeholders on a regular basis provide an opportunity to strengthen dialogues with and between Frontex's accountability fora. While the impact of these accountability dialogues has been modest so far, we nonetheless acknowledge their normative potential to enhance the accountability of Frontex.
Sous l’effet de la combinaison inédite de facteurs politiques, économiques et sociaux, la Méditerranée est de ces lieux où l’histoire s’est, au cours des dernières décennies, emballée. C’est dans ce ...contexte que la « mer du milieu » est devenue l’épicentre de ce que l’on désigne par la formule très approximative de « crise des migrants ». Ces mouvements telluriques n’en sont probablement qu’à leurs prémices. La force d’évocation négative du syntagme suffit pourtant à éclairer la mise en tension de l’Union et des États qui la constituent. Confrontée à un défi dont on mesure qu’il met à l’épreuve l’unité même de l’Union, celle-ci a fait le choix, somme toute classique, de la novation institutionnelle. Pour anticiper, canaliser et gérer ces flux humains, elle s’est dotée en 2004 de Frontex, devenue l’Agence européenne de gardes-frontières et gardes-côtes. Cette évolution est la déclinaison dans le domaine migratoire d’une dynamique dont l’objet est de moderniser l’action publique afin d’en renforcer, dit-on, l’efficacité. On entre ainsi dans un monde où la qualité des institutions s’apprécie à l’aune de leur « performance » sans être certain que leur aptitude à respecter les droits fondamentaux compte au nombre des indicateurs pertinents. Au fond, la question est posée de savoir si l’Union est parvenue à trouver un point d’équilibre acceptable par l’ensemble de ses membres entre les impératifs de sauvegarde inhérents à sa qualité même d’espace démocratique et l’attractivité d’un éden que les damnés de la terre sont prêts à rejoindre quoi qu’il en coûte. S’affranchissant des analyses exclusivement disciplinaires, cet ouvrage nous fait pénétrer au cœur des contradictions qui minent le processus d’agenciarisation appréhendé au prisme de la « crise des migrants en Méditerranée ».
This article tackles the issue of legal regulation of the use of force by the European Union based on the example of the European Border and Coast Guard Agency (Frontex), operating in the EU’s area ...of freedom, security, and justice. Due to the risks and threats related to border protection and migration management, Frontex has been endowed with extensive powers to use force in its operations. Using the concept of institutional isomorphism, the author argues that Frontex’s activities in the face of specific and extremely difficult challenges at the external borders of the EU have become a component of operations undertaken by the border services of the Member States, leading to an isomorphic “merging” of the activities of EU agencies and national border services, including the legal dimension of the use of force.
PDF
