Suchergebnisse

This paper starts from the encounter between a European navy vessel and a dinghy carrying boat refugees and other desperate migrants across the Mediterranean or West African Sea towards Europe. It explores the growing trend in the EU of enacting migration control at the high seas or international waters - so-called interdiction. It is argued that these forms of extraterritorial migra-tion control aim at reconquering the efficiency of the sovereign function to control migration, by trying to either deconstruct or shift correlate obligations vis-à-vis refugees and other persecuted persons to third States. In both instances, European States are entering into a sovereignty game, in which creative strategies are developed in order to reassert sovereign power unconstrained by national and international obligations. Starting from an analysis of the refugee regime itself, the paper looks at the possibilities for as-serting human rights extraterritorially, on the high seas, in foreign territorial waters and in relation to situations defined as search and rescue missions. On the basis of this, two interrelated dynamics emerge. The first concerns the legal debate surrounding the criteria for establishing extra-territorial jurisdiction. The so far restrictive interpretations applied provide a context for States to deconstruct protection responsibilities towards refugees by moving migration control outside their sovereign territory and into that of a foreign State. The second dynamic is what could be termed a growing commercialisation of sovereignty for the purpose of migration control. By negotiating access to foreign territorial waters or simply outsource the function of migration control to e.g. North and West African countries, European States are exploiting territorial principles of international law to shift and reduce refugee responsibilities.

When does the refugee encounter the State? The straightforward and traditional answer to this question would be, when arriving at the border and surrendering herself to the authorities uttering the magical word, asylum. Reality, however, only seldom conforms to this picture. Today, the person seeking asylum in the EU is much more likely to encounter the State before reaching the EU border - at the visa consulate, through the EU Immigration Liaison Officers posted at the airports of key migration transit and origin countries, during passage over the Mediterranean where navy vessels are patrolling. Alternatively, the refugee may not meet EU in persona, but through delegation, either in the form of an airline company bound by EU regulations ro carry out migration control or as a third State having in EU cooperation to perform exit border control or provide alternative protection in the region. This paper explores the growing nexus of these external or extraterritorial policies in the developing EU asylum and immigration policv. From a legal perspective, these developments create a number of challenges for ensuring the rights of asylum seekers and refugees. Looking into three contentious areas (extraterritorial jurisdiction, extraterritorial protection and extraterritorial policy implementation) it is argued that the present drive to move migration control and refugee protection outside the EU is becoming a strategic feature of the common EU asylum and immigration policy, in which States are instrumentalising the territorial principles of the present refugee regime to relieve themselves of international legal obligations and institutionalise a new ethos of ''protection lite.

Europas grænsekontrol er i en brydningstid:EU's engagement i opbygning af stærkere fælles kontrol ved de ydre grænser er slående, men medlemsstaterne er fortsat ansvarlige for at varetage kontrollen.

The present paper explores the growing link between EU's migration priorities and its foreign policy agenda. As part of the evolving EU acquis on asylum and immigration issues, particular priority has been given to cooperation with third countries and efforts to extend EU's possibilities for regulating migration flows well beyond its borders. As an emerging foreign policy issue, this paper asks how EU's migration priorities have translated into policies vis-à-vis third countries, what objectives these policies serve, and how this affects EU's overall foreign policy agenda and relations with countries of origin and transit? Using Joseph Nye's conceptualisation of 'hard' and 'soft' power, it is argued that EU is taking on a hegemonic position when initialising cooperation with third countries. As these countries are becoming more reluctant to take upon them the responsibility for preventing migration from reaching Europe, the EU is playing on a combination of 'attraction' and direct conditionality to ensure compliance. Yet, as the stakes are getting higher, ensuring cooperation may prove too costly, both financially and to EU's self-image.

This book offers an in-depth examination of the strategic use of State sovereignty in contemporary European and international affairs and the consequences of this for authority relations in Europe and beyond. It suggests a new approach to the study of State sovereignty, proposing to understand the use of sovereignty as games