What is temporary protection?
- The European Commission describes “temporary protection” under the TPD as an “exceptional measure to provide immediate and temporary protection to displaced persons from non-EU countries and those unable to return to their country of origin”.
- The directive applies when “there is a risk that the standard asylum system is struggling to cope with demand stemming from a mass influx risking a negative impact on the processing of claims”.
Background of TPD
- As the USSR disintegrated, the 1990s saw multiple instances of armed conflict and ethnic strife in Europe.
- Yugoslavia disintegrated into its constituent republics amid fighting;
- Croats and Serbs fought bloody wars in Bosnia;
- Azerbaijan and Armenia fought over the territory of Nagorno-Karabakh;
- the North Caucasus Russian republics of North Ossetia-Alania and Ingushetia clashed over the eastern part of the former territory’s Prigorodny district; and
- Transnistria, which made a bid for independence from Moldova as the Soviet Union collapsed, saw a short war.
Why establish standards?
- The Commission gives two reasons for doing so.
- “First, it reduces disparities between the policies of EU States on the reception and treatment of displaced persons in a situation of mass influx.
- Second, it promotes solidarity and burden-sharing among EU States with respect to receiving large numbers of potential refugees at one time.”
- Article 1 of Council Directive 2001/55/EC of 20 July 2001 underlines that the purpose of the Directive is to both “establish minimum standards for giving temporary protection” to displaced persons as well as to “promote a balance of effort between Member States in receiving and bearing the consequences of receiving such persons”.
Obligations under TPD
- According to the European Commission, the TPD “foresees harmonised rights for the beneficiaries of temporary protection”, which include:
- a residence permit for the duration of the protection (which can last from 1-3 years)
- appropriate information on temporary protection,
- access to employment,
- access to accommodation or housing,
- access to social welfare or means of subsistence,
- access to medical treatment,
- access to education for minors
- opportunities for families to reunite in certain circumstances, and
- for access to the normal asylum procedure.
- The TPD also contains provisions for the return of displaced persons to their country of origin, unless they have committed serious crimes or they “pose a threat to security from the benefit of temporary protection”.
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