{"id":728900,"date":"2026-01-29T16:12:11","date_gmt":"2026-01-29T16:12:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/728900\/"},"modified":"2026-01-29T16:12:11","modified_gmt":"2026-01-29T16:12:11","slug":"cypriot-presidency-of-the-council-of-the-eu","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/728900\/","title":{"rendered":"Cypriot Presidency of the Council of the EU"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"post-meta\">|Published on: 29th January 2026|Categories: <a href=\"https:\/\/ecre.org\/news\/news\/\" rel=\"category tag noopener\" target=\"_blank\">News<\/a>|<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/Cypriot-Presidency-of-the-Council-of-the-EU_Image-1080x675.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"\" width=\"1080\" height=\"675\"   data-pagespeed-url-hash=\"3776584962\" onload=\"pagespeed.CriticalImages.checkImageForCriticality(this);\"\/><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The Cypriot Presidency of the Council of the EU (January-June 2026) comes at a pivotal moment in the ongoing reform of the EU\u2019s policies in the areas of migration and asylum, culminating with the entry into action of the <a href=\"https:\/\/home-affairs.ec.europa.eu\/policies\/migration-and-asylum\/pact-migration-and-asylum_en\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Pact on Migration and Asylum<\/a> on 12 June.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">According to its <a href=\"https:\/\/cyprus-presidency.consilium.europa.eu\/en\/programme\/programme-of-the-cyprus-presidency\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">programme<\/a>, the Cypriot Presidency will prioritise the following migration- and asylum-related issues:<\/p>\n<ul style=\"text-align: justify;\">\n<li>Ensuring the \u2018coherent, fair and effective implementation\u2019 of the Pact on Migration and Asylum<\/li>\n<li>Promoting \u2018a more efficient, coherent and balanced\u2019 European returns system<\/li>\n<li>Concluding negotiations on the safe third country concept and the EU list of safe countries of origin<\/li>\n<li>Advancing the \u2018efficiency\u2019 of the external dimension of migration \u2018based on a \u201cwhole of route\u201d approach and respecting geographical balance\u2019, including through \u2018mutually beneficial strategic partnerships with key international partners on a \u201cmore for more\u201d basis\u2019.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">In addition, it has committed to \u2018initiate and conclude\u2019 negotiations on the planned <a href=\"https:\/\/www.consilium.europa.eu\/en\/press\/press-releases\/2024\/12\/13\/migrant-smuggling-member-states-reach-agreement-on-criminal-law\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">EU directive on migrant smuggling<\/a> and to promote the \u2018swift implementation\u2019 of the <a href=\"https:\/\/north-africa-middle-east-gulf.ec.europa.eu\/what-we-do\/pact-mediterranean_en\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Pact for the Mediterranean<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">On 22 January, the Cypriot Presidency hosted an <a href=\"https:\/\/cyprus-presidency.consilium.europa.eu\/en\/news\/home-affairs-ministers-discuss-returns-reintegration-and-schengen-measures\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">informal Justice and Home Affairs (JHA) Council meeting<\/a> in Nicosia. EU interior ministers discussed \u201csustainable approaches to return and reintegration\u201d, Syria and Afghanistan, and the functioning of the Schengen Area. Other <a href=\"https:\/\/cyprus-presidency.consilium.europa.eu\/en\/events\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">high-level migration- and asylum-related events<\/a> in the coming months include:<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><strong>Relevant ECRE publications<\/strong><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><strong>See also<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"|Published on: 29th January 2026|Categories: News| The Cypriot Presidency of the Council of the EU (January-June 2026) comes&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":728901,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5174],"tags":[2000,299,5187,1699],"class_list":{"0":"post-728900","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-eu","8":"tag-eu","9":"tag-europe","10":"tag-european","11":"tag-european-union"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115979271930088564","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/728900","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=728900"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/728900\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/728901"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=728900"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=728900"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=728900"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}