On 7 October 2019, the Commissioner for Human Rights, Dunja Mijatović, published a statement ahead of the EU Justice and Home Affairs Council meeting, saying that they should not miss the chance to steer migration policy on to a more humane and human rights compliant path. The Commissioner welcomed efforts already made to enhance responsibility sharing among member states and to ensure persons rescued at sea can be disembarked swiftly and in a place of safety, provided this is set up with adequate human rights safeguards. She said that discussions must now also focus on improving human rights protection in other areas of European migration policy, especially the prevention of returns to countries where those rescued at sea would face serious human rights violations. Further, she pointed out that today, member states have a chance to prevent further disastrous human rights and humanitarian consequences by suspending any co-operation activities with the Libyan authorities that impact on interceptions at sea and result in returns to Libya, until clear guarantees of full human-rights compliance are in place.

The statement also highlighted other crucial steps, such as expanding search and rescue capacity; providing safe and legal routes; co-operating constructively with NGOs; ensuring that instructions issued by member states to shipmasters do not lead to returns to places where migrants can suffer human rights violations; and preventing the transfer of responsibility for coordinating rescue operations to authorities that clearly do not respect human rights.”

The Commissioner published in June a Recommendation on the necessary steps to protect migrants in the Mediterranean: Lives saved. Rights protected. Bridging the protection gap for refugees and migrants in the Mediterranean. It is available in English, French, Italian and Spanish.