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Last Monday, September 16th, Germany reestablished border checks on its borders with Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg and Denmark. This move is not an isolated event; in fact, it marks the fourth instance in just six months that Germany has given notice of temporarily reintroducing border controls. In addition to Germany - Austria, Slovenia, Italy, Norway, Sweden and France have all implemented such measures over the past six months [1], citing concerns over security, migration control and public safety as reasons for these actions [1]. All these facts combined signal a growing trend that indicates a significant shift in European mobility [...]

On 24th February 2022, exactly two years ago, Russia launched its unprovoked and unjustifiable full scale invasion of Ukraine. This full scale attack was a further escalation of the ongoing conflict since February 2014, when Russia illegally occupied and annexed Crimea, later supporting separatists in the regions of Donbas and Luhansk, where the fighting was ongoing for 8 years before the escalation.  The full scale invasion has led to immense human suffering, the loss of hundreds of thousands of lives, including tens of thousands of civilian casualties. Since the escalation of the war, nearly 1 800 children have been killed. [...]

AEGEE-Europe is deeply concerned about the recent reports at the European borders. On June 14, 2023, a fishing boat that departed Libya and was carrying hundreds of migrants sank near the coast of Greece. This tragedy, which resulted in the death of almost everyone on board, happened in a context where both FRONTEX, the EU’s border control agency, and the Greek authorities made no rescue attempts (International Rescue Committee, 2023). More recently, another tragedy occured on August 3, and to this date, only 4 survivors were rescued by a merchant vessel near Lampedusa, while 41 people are still missing (United [...]

The 1951 Convention and the 1967 Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees defines refugees as people who are unable or unwilling to return to their country of origin owing to a well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group, or political opinion (1). It was signed into law by 146 countries including all European countries (except San Marino and Andorra) and protects the legal status of refugees and commits signatories to ensuring their safety and basic rights such as the right to family unification and the right to non-refoulement (protection [...]