Bonn, Germany, 24 June 2026

On 17 June 2026, the European Parliament approved the new EU Return Regulation. The vote completes the legal framework that began with the Pact on Migration and Asylum, which entered into force earlier this month. The Regulation widens the grounds and length of detention, introduces new ‘return hubs’ outside the EU, strengthens the mutual recognition of return decisions between Member States, and narrows some of the safeguards and appeal routes available to people facing removal.

As Evangelicals, migration is not a side issue for us. We believe every person carries the image of God. That conviction has shaped our work since the 2015 refugee crisis. Through our Refugee Campaign, we built resources for churches and for asylum seekers. We paid special attention to converts, whose faith is too often misjudged in the asylum process. Together with CCME and COMECE, we contributed good-practice ideas on how converts should be interviewed. These ideas helped shape the EU Agency for Asylum’s 2023 Practical Guide on religion-based asylum claims. We were also working with CCME and COMECE on a Glossary of Terms for interpreters and case workers, helping them understand Christian language and practice.

We recognise the legitimate duty of governments to manage migration responsibly, secure external borders, and combat human trafficking. None of this stands in tension with our faith; it flows from a proper concern for order and the common good.

At the same time, several elements of this Regulation trouble us. Detention will now last longer and can apply to families with children. Return hubs will operate in third countries, often far from public scrutiny, and it remains unclear how conditions there will be monitored. Appeal routes have also been narrowed, making it harder to catch errors before they cause lasting harm.

These changes fall hardest on those whose situations are already difficult to assess. Converts are one such group: their claims rest on personal testimony rather than paperwork, and a rushed or opaque process leaves little room to get that assessment right. Victims of trafficking and other vulnerable people face similar risks.

Every migrant, returnee, and asylum seeker is a person made in the image of God. That dignity does not depend on legal status, and it does not disappear at a border. As Good News People, we believe security and compassion are not competing values, and that Europe is capable of holding both.

We therefore ask the European Commission and Member States to preserve genuine access to legal remedies, give particular care to converts and other vulnerable claimants, ensure transparency and independent monitoring wherever return hubs are established, and continue to consult civil society as the rules are implemented.

For our part, the EEA will stay engaged: with the EUAA, with our network of national Evangelical Alliances, and with the churches who walk alongside asylum seekers day to day. This is work we have sustained for years, and we intend to continue it.

Our hope is simple: that Europe’s response to migration will reflect both justice and mercy – and we believe it can still do both.

For further information, please contact:

Rev. Jan Wessels and Rev. Connie Duarte Co-General Secretaries of the European Evangelical Alliance Email: Phone: +31 616754574

Press Contact:

European Evangelical Alliance (EEA)

Matthias Boehning, Operations Manager

+49 173 738 02 11

Reuterstrasse 116, 53129 Bonn, Germany

www.europeanea.org

http://www.facebook.com/EuropeanEA