1/7/2005
A New tool to deal with illegal immigration in the Mediterranean

The Commission has adopted this week the ARGO Work Programme 2005, which aims at promoting cooperation between Member States in the areas of external borders, visas, asylum and immigration. This year’s Programme provides 2 million euros out of the total budget (nearly 6.7 million euros) to support operational activities to address the emergencies caused by illegal immigration in the Mediterranean. This responds to the June Justice and Home Affairs Council call to address the crisis situation in the Mediterranean and to prevent the human tragedies that take place following attempts to enter the EU illegally by sea.

This will be the fourth year of implementation of the ARGO programme. In order to respond rapidly to the Council’s call, the 2005 ARGO Work Programme will provide for a specific work programme focused on a limited number of objectives and actions to address the problems caused by illegal immigration by sea in the Mediterranean.

The areas in which the programme supports activities are:

External borders (e.g. effectiveness of controls at the external borders)

Visas (e.g. compliance with the principles of Community legislation on issuing visas, harmonisation of rules on the examination of visa applications, harmonisation of exceptions, etc.)

Asylum (e.g. establishment of a common European asylum system, determination of the State responsible for examining an asylum application, approximation of rules on the recognition and content of refugee status, etc.)

Immigration (e.g. effective, and homogeneous application of rules on legal immigration, fight against illegal immigration and return of illegal residents, etc.).

To be eligible for co-financing under the ARGO programme, actions must be proposed by the national agencies of one Member State and involve at least two other Member States or another Member State and either a candidate country or a third country. The ARGO action programme may finance up to 60 % of the cost of the action (or up to 80 % in exceptional circumstances).

The call for proposals for the ARGO programme is available at the following website:
http://europa.eu.int/comm/justice_home/funding/argo/funding_argo_en.htm