The FINANCIAL — On March 25 the European Commission has approved 22 new multiannual national programmes under the Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund (AMIF) and the Internal Security Fund (ISF) for the period 2014-2020, worth together approximately €1.8 billion.
An additional 36 national programmes will be approved later this year. These two strands of EU funding support Member States’ efforts in the fields of asylum, migration and integration, and internal security.
Migration, Home Affairs and Citizenship Commissioner Dimitris Avramopoulos said: “Migration is one of the ten priorities of this Commission. Making migration policy work in all its aspects is essential to the overall success of our societies. We want people to thrive and we want people to be safe. But Member States cannot do this alone. That is why the European Commission has consistently given tangible support to the Member States and will continue to do so.”
The AMIF funding supports national efforts to: enhance reception capacities, improve the quality of asylum procedures in line with the Union standards, integrate migrants at local and regional levels and increase the sustainability of return programmes. The ISF programme supports national efforts to improve Member States’ border management (in particular through the use of interoperable modern technologies), improve cross-border law enforcement cooperation and strengthen Member States’ capacity to effectively manage security-related risks such as terrorism and violent radicalisation, drug trafficking, cybercrime and cyber security, trafficking in human beings, and other forms of organised crime.
In addition to the basic allocation (see Annex 2), most of the programmes approved by the Commission today benefit from additional amounts made available to some Member States who volunteered for the implementation of specific actions with a strong transnational dimension such as joint return and reintegration projects under the AMIF or the setting up of consular cooperation under the ISF. Additional funding under some of the ISF programmes will also be invested in the purchase of large scale equipment, which will be put at the disposal of Frontex joint operations whenever needed. Almost €100 million channelled through the AMIF programmes will be used to support the Union Resettlement Programme in the period 2014-2015.
The Commission is working towards the swift approval of the remaining national programmes. With a total budget of almost €7 billion for the period 2014-20 for AMIF and ISF, these Funds are the principal EU financial instruments for investing in an open and secure Europe.
Discussion about this post