Study on the gaps and needs of EU law in the area of return
Dear Migration and Home Affairs,
Under the right of access to documents in the EU treaties, as developed in Regulation 1049/2001, I am requesting documents which contain the following information:
- The study “Gaps and needs of EU law in the area of return”, commissioned by the Directorate-General for Migration and Home Affairs to a consortium of the ICF, in collaboration with the Migration Policy Institute (MPI Europe), the European Policy Centre (EPC), and the Odysseus Network, which informed the proposal for a Regulation establishing a common system for the return of third-country nationals staying illegally in the Union, and repealing Directive 2008/115/EC of the European Parliament and the Council, Council Directive 2001/40/EC and Council Decision 2004/191/EC.
This request follows up on request EASE/363, which was refused because the Commission did not hold the information for the reason that work on the study was still ongoing due to an extension of the contract with the consultants.
Should the study not yet be concluded, I request to be informed of the deadline by which the study will be ready, as per the Commission's contract with the consultants.
Yours faithfully,
Silvia Carta
Rue du Congrès 37, 1000 Bruxelles, Belgium
Dear Sir or Madam,
We hereby acknowledge the receipt of your request for access to documents
sent on 01/12/2025 and registered on 01/12/2025 under the case number
2025/6301.
We will handle your request within 15 working days as of the date of
registration. The time-limit expires on 22/12/2025. We will let you know
if we need to extend this time limit for additional 15 working days.
To find more information on how we process your personal data, please see
[1]the privacy statement.
Yours faithfully,
Directorate-General for Migration and Home Affairs - Access to Documents
European Commission
References
Visible links
1. https://ec.europa.eu/info/principles-and...
Dear Ms Carta,
We are writing concerning your request for access to Commission documents
registered on 01/12/2025 under the reference number EASE 2025/6301.
Your application is currently being handled. However, we will not be in a
position to complete the handling of your application within the time
limit of 15 working days, which expires on 22/12/2025. An extended time
limit is needed as the application concerns documents held by different
services, which must be consulted.
Therefore, in line with Article 7(3) of Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001, we
need to extend this time limit by 15 additional working days. The new time
limit expires on 22/01/2026.
We apologise for this delay and for any inconvenience this may cause.
Kind regards,
DG HOME - Access to documents team
