The immigration bill was submitted to Parliament on Friday (8/9). This is the bill from the Ministry of Migration and Asylum titled “Reform of framework and procedures for returns of third-country nationals,” which concerns the institutional framework regarding illegal immigration.
The bill, as the ministry emphasizes, “comes to fill identified gaps in the implementation of the existing framework, prioritizing the need for effective management of returns, prevention of abuse of asylum procedures and strengthening of the rule of law.”
The main points of the bill:
Updated definitions according to new regulation guidelines
- Expansion of the concept of country of return. Added as countries of return: a) the country of habitual residence, b) the safe third country, as defined in article 91 of law 4939/2022 (A’ 111), due to which the international protection application was rejected as inadmissible and c) the first country of asylum due to which the international protection application was rejected as inadmissible.
- Addition of risk of flight definitions in a stricter direction. Added as objective criteria that constitute risk of flight a) the lack of residence or known accommodation, b) abandoning or changing place of residence or known accommodation without prior notification of competent authorities and c) refusal to submit to identification by biometric or other means.
Voluntary departure
- Reduction of prescribed deadlines for voluntary departure (from 25 to 14 days), as well as for extension of voluntary departure deadline for exceptional reasons (from 120 to 60 days).
- Imposition of electronic monitoring as a restrictive measure during the voluntary departure deadline.
Entry ban to the country
- Framework tightening, according to regulation guidelines. Provided as a mandatory reason for entry ban is the risk from the presence of the third-country national to public order and security, national security and public health.
- Extension of the duration of entry ban period (from 5 to 10 years) and introduction of possibility to extend it by up to 5 years.
Criminalization of illegal stay in the country after completion of administrative procedure
- Imprisonment of at least three years, monetary penalty of 10,000 euros, No possibility of conversion or suspension of sentence execution.
- Possibility of sentence execution suspension under the condition of declaration by the convicted third-country national for voluntary departure from Greece. The suspension begins with departure from the country.
- The options for whoever remains illegally in the country will be two: Either prison or return.
Detention
- Extension of detention reasons to include security matters. Explicit provision for non-suspension of detention in case of objections, extension of detention duration, including provided extensions, according to regulation guidelines from 18 months to 24 and review of detention conditions every six months.
- Increase of monetary penalty for those who illegally re-enter the country, from 3,000 to 10,000 euros to 10,000 to 30,000 euros.
- Increase of penalty limits for those who illegally enter the country, from 3 months to at least 2 years, in case of aggravating circumstances from 6 months to at least 3 years.
- Increase of monetary penalty from 1,500 to 5,000 euros, and in case of aggravating circumstances from 3,000 to 10,000 euros.
- Restriction of the possibility of subsequent international protection applications.
- Abolition of granting residence permits for those residing illegally in the country for 7 years.
