The European Council has designated Kosovo and seven other countries as “safe” for asylum purposes. According to the Council, the new EU migration laws aim to establish faster and more effective asylum procedures for those who are not entitled to protection within the EU.

The new regulation, which revises the concept of a safe third country, will expand the circumstances under which an asylum application may be rejected as inadmissible. The Council also finalized an important part of the 2024 Migration and Asylum Pact, agreeing on the EU’s first common list of safe countries of origin, which will allow member states to handle international protection claims in an accelerated manner.

The Council agreed that, in addition to Kosovo, the EU-level safe countries of origin include Bangladesh, Colombia, Egypt, India, Morocco, and Tunisia.

Denmark’s Minister for Immigration and Integration, Rasmus Stoklund, emphasized that Denmark and most EU member states have advocated for processing asylum applications in safe third countries in order to remove incentives for migrants to undertake dangerous journeys toward the EU.

“I am pleased that we have agreed on a general approach to revising the concept of a ‘safe third country’, which allows member states to make arrangements with safe third countries for processing asylum applications outside Europe,” he said.