1 Amendments of Kristina WINBERG related to 2015/0211(COD)
Amendment 48 #
Proposal for a regulation
Recital 16
Recital 16
(16) As regards Turkey, the legal basis for protection against persecution and mistreatment iscannot be regarded as being adequately provided by substantive and procedural human rights and anti- discrimination legislation, including membership of all. Although the country has acceded to major international human rights treaties, Turkey has invoked reservations of a geographically restrictive nature in relation to the Geneva Convention of 1951 relating to the Status of Refugees. Specifically, Turkey has stated that it will only consider asylum applications which arise from events that have occurred in Europe. This means that the Turkish State will not under any circumstances approve asylum applications lodged by people who come from countries outside Europe. This in turn breaches provisions of the Geneva Convention which concern refugees' rights and infringes the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights (Articles 18 and 19) and the principle of equal treatment. In 2014, the European Court of Human Rights found violations in 94 out of 2899 applications. There are no indications of any incidents of refoulement of its own citizens. In 2014, Member States considered that 23,.1 % (310) of asylum applications of citizens of Turkey were well-founded. O, which shows that serious human rights problems still remain which need to be tackled. Only one Member State has designated Turkey as a safe country of origin. Turkey has been designated as a candidate country by the European Council and negotiations have been opened. At that timee time when that decision was taken, the assessment was that Turkey fulfilled the criteria established by the Copenhagen European Council of 21-22 June 1993 relating to stability of institutions guaranteeing democracy, the rule of law, human rights and respect for and protection of minorities and Turkey will have to continue to fulfil these criteria for becoming a member in line with the recommendations provided in the Annual Progress Report, but since then Turkey has repeatedly breached the Copenhagen Criteria, and it must fulfil these criteria on a permanent basis if the country is to be regarded as a safe country of origin. It follows from this observation that it will be impossible to implement the agreement between Greece and Turkey on the return of economic migrants and persons who have no justified claim to asylum.