European Commission delays decision on asylum seeker quotas

The European Commission will not meet the deadline to adopt its report on migration in the EU over the previous year, which will serve as the basis for decisions on the matter at the bloc's level, Euronews has learned.

“The Commission will take more time to fine-tune the report, which should be adopted soon, in the next weeks”, internal sources told Euronews, explaining that consultations with member states are still ongoing.

The EU executive was required, through new regulations, to adopt the migration report by Wednesday and to pass it to the European Parliament and the Council.

The European Annual Asylum and Migration Report should include an assessment of the overall migratory situation across EU countries, such as the number of asylum applications, the number of persons granted international protection, irregular entries, and reception capacity.

It will designate some EU countries as being “under migratory pressure”, “at risk of migratory pressure” or “facing a significant migratory situation”. This designation would pave the way for a so-called solidarity mechanism, under which asylum seekers would be relocated to other member states.

Alongside the report, the Commission plans to establish an Annual Solidarity Pool to determine the total number of asylum seekers to be relocated and the amount each member state should allocate.

Together, the report and the solidarity pool would be the basis for developing the system of "mandatory solidarity" envisaged in the Pact on Migration and Asylum, the major reform of migration policy adopted in 2024.

This “mandatory solidarity” should be provided by each member state in proportion to its population and total GDP. This means that the most prominent and wealthiest EU countries are asked to do more to manage the EU asylum system.

According to this system, EU members' governments could choose among hree options to meet the needs outlined in the solidarity pool: relocate a certain number of asylum seekers to their own territory, pay €20,000 per person they do not relocate, or finance operational support in member states under migratory pressure.

According to the regulations, each solidarity pool should include at least 30,000 relocations and €600 million in financial contributions.

Once proposed by the Commission, the Annual Solidarity Pool must be approved by the EU member states, which can reject the proposal only with a qualified majority — meaning at least 15 countries out of 27 representing at least 65% of the total EU population have to say no.

Criticising the Commission's failure to meet the deadline, German lawmaker Birgit Sippel, one of the leading MEPs in the negotiations on the migration pact, announced on social media that she is calling for an urgent meeting in the European Parliament's Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs.

According to the mid-year review of the European Union Agency for Asylum, Germany lost the top spot among EU countries for the most asylum requests in the first half of 2025. France (78,000) and Spain (77,000) both received more applications than Germany, which has been the leading destination for asylum seekers in recent years.

Spain is the EU country that has granted the highest number of protection status to asylum seekers in the second quarter of 2025 (16,060, 24.4% of the EU total), ahead of France (14,220, 21.6%), Germany (13,450, 20.5%), and Italy (7,360, 11.2%).