Promoting Quality in EU Asylum Procedures

A conference to mark the end of a UNHCR-led, EU-funded project on "Further Developing EU Asylum Quality" has just ended. For an introduction to this and other related projects that have focused on improving the quality of asylum procedures in EU member states, read this factsheet. These projects are also described in greater detail below:

Asylum Systems Quality Assurance and Evaluation Mechanism (ASQAEM) Project in the Central and Eastern Europe Sub-region

- Implemented in Bulgaria, Hungary, Poland, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia between 2008 and 2010. For more details, read the summary of the final report, review some of the checklists developed, and get a mid-term update via this conference report.

Further Developing Asylum Quality: A Multi-Phase Project for Southern and Central Europe [info]

- The aim of this project was to "examine and develop quality assurance mechanisms in the asylum procedures of selected Member States: Bulgaria, Cyprus, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Poland, Portugal, Romania and Slovakia." It was built in part on findings from the ASQAEM Project described above. implemented earlier in the Central and Eastern Europe sub-region.

Research Project on the Application of Key Provisions of the Asylum Procedures Directive in Selected EU Member States

- For this project, which concluded in 2010, UNHCR investigated "how the EU's Asylum Procedures Directive has been applied in Belgium, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, the Netherlands, Slovenia, Spain and the United Kingdom." The following reports were produced:

• Improving Asylum Procedures: Comparative Analysis and Recommendations for Law and Practice - Key Findings and Recommendations
• Improving Asylum Procedures: Comparative Analysis and Recommendations for Law and Practice - Detailed Research on Key Asylum Procedures Directive Provisions
• Improving Asylum Procedures: Comparative Analysis and Recommendations for Law and Practice - Key Findings and Recommendations on Credibility and Country of Origin Information
• Improving Asylum Procedures: Comparative Analysis and Recommendations for Law and Practice - Key Gender Related Findings and Recommendations

Quality Initiative Projects

- As the factsheet above notes, quality-related activities have been undertaken in a number of individual countries, including the United Kingdom, Sweden, the Czech Republic, Austria and Germany. The UK's projects are described here, while the final report for the quality initiative project in Sweden is accessible here (in Swedish only); see also this news release.

One of the speakers at the above-mentioned conference, the Executive Director of the European Asylum Support Office (EASO), was subsequently interviewed by ECRE. The transcript can be accessed via the EASO Monitor blog.

[Photo credit: UNHCR/B. Szandelszky; source: "A Somali asylum-seeker is questioned in a European country," UNHCR, March 2010)]

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