“The policies towards migrants and asylum-seekers require further review”. This was emphasised by Thomas Hammarberg, the Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights, when presenting today his report on the Netherlands. The report addresses also issues on children’s rights, integration, actions against discrimination and intolerance, and anti-terrorism measures.
While recognizing progress, the report calls for an improvement of the safeguards for asylum-seekers. The Commissioner voiced also concern about the plans to process more applications through an enhanced accelerated procedure. “A fast procedure is certainly suitable for clear-cut cases, but it can be detrimental to all others and is clearly unsuitable for vulnerable groups such as victims of violence and unaccompanied children.”