The percentage of asylum applications that are granted in the Netherlands has fallen sharply this year. While the Immigration and Naturalization Service (IND) approved 56 percent of the first applications last year, only a third are now granted. That shows figures from the Ministry of Asylum and Migration.
According to the IND, the decrease can partly be explained by a changed assessment of asylum requests from Syria. After the fall of the Assad regime, the country has been largely declared safe. “While Syrian refugees used to receive asylum almost as a matter of course, this is no longer the case. This affects the acceptance rate,” says an IND spokesperson.
The admission policy has also been tightened for other groups. For example, applications from countries such as Yemen, Turkey and Iraq are more often rejected because the security situation there is assessed differently.
The adjusted country policy does not cover the whole picture. Asylum lawyers and experts say that the sharp decline cannot be seen separately from a new working method at the IND, which has been in effect since July 1 last year. Following dissatisfaction in the House of Representatives about the ‘too high’ Dutch compliance percentage, a stricter credibility test was introduced.
No papers
Asylum seekers who cannot substantiate their story with documents now have to meet a series of conditions. “I hear it everywhere,” says Wil Eikelboom, chairman of the Association of Asylum Lawyers in the Netherlands. “If you do not meet one of those conditions, you will quickly be declared unbelievable.”
Asylum lawyer Bart Toemen recognizes the decline in the figures from his own practice. “The approvals have gone down significantly,” he says. “And the new work instructions from the IND certainly play a role in this.”
He sees clients being rejected on matters where this did not happen before. “If you came here without identity papers, or cannot substantiate your story with documents, this is now a problem for the IND. red flag“, says Toemen. “Then it doesn’t matter much what else you supply, you’ll just get wet.”
Legal psychologist Tanja van Veldhuizen, who obtained her PhD in asylum practice and regularly provides training to IND employees, also sees a connection with the new working method. “You only get around to a substantive assessment of someone’s story when a series of conditions are met,” she says. “And you may wonder how realistic those conditions are.” In the new instructions, for example, it is important to determine whether someone has submitted his asylum application on time or whether he answers all questions completely. “If you apply the work instructions strictly, you can drop out early in the assessment,” says Van Veldhuizen. “Then someone is in fact rejected on procedural grounds, while you have not yet really looked at the core question in asylum law: does this person run a real risk of persecution?”
The question is also to what extent these stricter rejections will hold up in court. According to lawyer Toemen, the majority of IND decisions are annulled in his appeal cases. Judges then rule that the service has paid too little attention to the applicant’s complete story, or that it has not properly considered the risks upon return.
“You may therefore wonder whether the new work instructions are more efficient for the IND,” says Van Veldhuizen. “If more appeals are declared well-founded, this will result in double work for the IND. It will then have to reassess all those rejected applications.”
Courts still differ on how strictly the new instruction may be applied. The Council of State, the highest administrative court in the country, is currently considering that question; a final ruling is expected next year.
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