Common European Asylum System in a Changing World

3. INSTRUMENTS OF CEAS (IN MORE DETAILS)

3.1 Introduction As already explained above, the legal framework of the CEAS is based on EU law, which consists of primary law (the Treaties) and secondary law (the legal acts). The Treaties set objectives, values, rights, and rules on the functioning of the Union with which secondary law must comply. The Treaty of Lisbon, adopted on 13 December 2007 and entered into force on 1 December 2009, requires the EU’s common policy on asylum to be in accordance with the 1951 Geneva Convention, the corner stone of the international protection regime, but also with other relevant international instruments. In addition, it is important to remember that EU legislation is implemented within the national legal order of Member States. In practice, the CEAS is composed of three layers; international law, EU law, and national law. The legal acts of the Union are listed in Article 288 TFEU. They are regulations, directives, decisions , recommendations, and opinions . The latter two instruments have no binding force, the relevant legal acts constituting the CEAS are the Regulations (Dublin III and EURODAC), the Directives (Reception conditions, Qualification, and Asylum procedures) and the Decisions (for example Council decision establishing a relocation mechanism within the EU). To summarize what you shall know about their legal nature: • Regulations Regulations are binding in their entirety and shall be directly and uniformly applicable to all EU countries as soon as they enter into force, with (generally and usually) no need to be transposed into national law. They are binding in their entirety on generally all EU countries . • Directives Directives require EU countries to achieve a certain result. EU countries must adopt national measures to incorporate them into national law (transpose) in order to achieve the objectives set by the directive. National authorities must communicate these measures to the European Commission. Transposition into national law must take place by the deadline set in the directive. When a country does not transpose a directive in time or properly, the Commission may initiate infringement proceedings. • Decisions Decisions are binding in their entirety and they apply to one or more EU countries, companies or individuals. They don’t need to be transposed into national law. The Treaty of Lisbon broadened the competences of the EU in asylum issues. According to Article 78 TFEU a common policy on asylum is developed through the ordinary legislative procedure (i.e together with the European Parliament). There is no mention of minimum standards anymore. The Article provides the legal basis for the CEAS comprising of: a) a uniform status of asylum, valid throughout the EU

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