Overview
- Interior ministers adopted a negotiating stance by qualified majority, with Spain, Greece, France and Portugal voting against.
- The package creates the first EU list of safe countries of origin — Bangladesh, Colombia, Egypt, India, Kosovo, Morocco and Tunisia — to enable faster processing and more inadmissibility decisions.
- Revised rules broaden the safe third country concept by removing a required personal link, limiting the automatic right to remain during appeals and excluding unaccompanied minors from agreement-based transfers.
- The returns file introduces tools such as a European Return Order, wider use of biometrics and identity obligations, longer detention and entry bans, Schengen system insertion and optional mutual recognition to be reviewed after two years.
- The position provides a legal basis for return hubs outside the EU, with Italy pointing to its Albania facilities, and sets a 2026 solidarity scheme of up to 21,000 relocations or €420 million for states under pressure.