The inform provides a comprehensive overview of good practices and challenges in coordinating the return and reintegration of third-country nationals across EMN Member and Observer Countries. It highlights the importance of a coherent approach involving the alignment of various stakeholders and explores how improved coordination among stakeholders, strengthened institutional frameworks, and effective national strategies can ensure a systematic and structured approach to return and reintegration.
The EU Strategy for Voluntary Return and Reintegration serves as the backdrop for this inform. The strategy highlights coherence, in this context understood as the systematic alignment of various actors and phases involved at the national level, as essential for effective and sustainable return and reintegration policies.
The inform finds that most EMN Member and Observer Countries have implemented a coherent approach characterized by institutional cooperation, clearly defined roles, and strategic alignment among different stakeholders. The inform also identifies effective practices. For example, Spain and France have legal frameworks defining roles and cooperation mechanisms for return and reintegration. Latvia, Cyprus, and Malta use Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) to guide cooperation. Sweden, Belgium, and Finland have set up working groups to facilitate communication and collaboration among key actors.
Despite these efforts, countries face challenges in achieving full coherence, including coordination gaps, resource shortages, fragmented monitoring systems, and the need for harmonized standards. For example, Germany's federal system involves multiple stakeholders, what can complicate coordination; Sweden reports that differing agency priorities can hinder a unified approach; and Belgium emphasized the need for harmonized standards at the EU level to avoid duplication and inefficiency.
The inform highlights that aligning return and reintegration policies with other national policies, such as internal security and development assistance, supports coherence and effectiveness.
The EMN inform 'Coherent Return and Reintegration Assistance' is available for download in the Publications Section.