03 August 2026
Ceuta at the Fault Lines of European Solidarity
On Friday morning, Europeans woke up to unsettling news. Within 24 hours, approximately 60,000 migrants successfully managed to reach the Spanish enclave of Ceuta in North Africa, and several dozen have been reported dead in the attempt to swim across the border. Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez has ordered the military to support the Civil Guard on the ground. What caused this sudden influx? Does EU law offer the procedures and mechanisms to respond to the spontaneous arrival of such large numbers of people? And what do these events reveal about the internal functioning of the EU’s migration and asylum regime and solidarity between Member States? Continue reading >>
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21 July 2026
Silver Linings
In June 2026, after a two-year transition, the EU Migration and Asylum Pact became applicable across the Union. The European Council on Refugees and Exiles, representing 122 NGOs, called it “a dark day for Europe”, while Viktor Orbán called it “another nail in the coffin of the European Union”. But the Pact made intra-EU solidarity permanent, automatic, and binding. Furthermore, it codified entitlements for asylum seekers that national courts and the CJEU can enforce. Advocates can build on both of these two elements, even as they forcefully critique many other problematic aspects of the Pact. Continue reading >>
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