The European Commission unveiled on Tuesday a series of measures designed to give the EU’s border control agency, the Warsaw-based Frontex, more powers to combat the entry and enhance the return of illegal immigrants.
“The new reality requires a new mandate for Frontex,” European Executive Vice-President for Tech Sovereignty, Security and Democracy Henna Virkkunen told a press conference. “With these important proposals we are significantly strengthening our external borders and the support we can offer our member states.”
Key measures the European Commission are proposing, which will still need to be agreed by the member state governments in the Council of the EU, include more resources and operational capacity, a Quick Reaction Force to intervene in crisis situations, and a new Online Monitoring Centre to scan social media and identify bad actors in order to early detect potential threats at the borders. It will also develop a dedicated Return Coordination Centre and will now be able to help carry out returns of migrants from third countries by facilitating deportations from return hubs.
While the irregular entry of migrants to the bloc are well down from their peak during the migration crisis of 2015-2016, when almost 1.5 million first-time asylum applications were made by new arrivals, the latest EU-wide Eurobarometer survey still found 65 per cent of EU citizens were concerned about uncontrolled immigration. This has led to big electoral gains by far-right parties in the member states and the European Parliament, prompting the European Commission to take a more robust approach to irregular migration.
More recently, July’s Ceuta migrant crisis, when an estimated 70,000 to 80,000 Moroccan migrants mass-crossed the border into the Spanish North African enclave, partly fuelled by disinformation online, has added to the sense that more must be done to strengthen border insecurity.
“Our borders face new challenges: orchestrated crossings by smuggling networks, changing routes, hybrid threats, instrumentalization of migration – no member state can meet these challenges alone,” said European Commissioner for Internal Affairs and Migration Magnus Brunner. “Our response has to be faster, stronger and better coordinated.”
Brunner noted that the return rate of migrants who have no right of stay in the EU was still too low at 32-33 per cent, and the proposed new powers for Frontex will make the agency “the central EU actor on returns”.
Following the entry into force of the new Return Regulation on October 16, the European Commission is proposing a new regulation to digitalise the return, readmission and reintegration procedures across the EU, with the aim of modernising the handling of return cases by simplifying and speeding up administrative procedures through digitalisation, reduced administrative burdens, and improving data collection and sharing.
This will require more manpower and the European Commission is proposing to gradually increase Frontex’s standing corps to 30,000 officers by doubling the amount of Frontex’s own standing corps officers and creating a new “European border and return reserve” of 17 000 officers ready to be deployed when needed. According to Politico, the agency had around 7,800 personnel in its standing corps in early 2026 and is working towards a target of 10,000 by 2027.