The European Commission will not help journalists facing jail in Egypt even though its multi-billion-euro EU-Egypt deal signed in 2024 is conditional on human rights.

On Thursday (29 October), it read out a prepared statement, noting the importance of independent media outlets and that its agreement with Egypt includes a commitment to universal values of democracy, rule of law and human rights.

The statement was read after Cairo cracked down on Lina Attalah, chief editor of the independent media outlet Mada Masr.

The journalist was convicted on Wednesday by a court in Cairo for operating a website without a licence even though she had made multiple attempts over the years to obtain such a licence.

Her latest application for a licence has been pending without response since 2023 and her site has been blocked in Egypt since 2017.

She was fined some €48,000 and ordered to shut down the outlet, highlighting a pattern of abuse against journalists and civil society throughout Egypt, a country deemed an essential partner for the EU in its efforts to curb migration.

As of early October, Egypt has imprisoned 25 journalists.

In response, the commission at a press briefing re-read its short statement on the importance of independent media in Egypt.

Asked if this also means it would press Egypt to drop its case against Lina Attalah, a commission spokesperson said he would not “go further than what we have already put out there”.

Pressed if the crackdown against her is a demonstration of the values cited in its €7.4bn agreement with Egypt, he deferred to another spokesperson before walking off the stage. No other comment was made on the matter.

The response has drawn criticism from rights defenders.

“We don’t need the EU to tell us that Egypt jails journalists. We need to know what it’s going to do about it,” said Claudio Francavilla of Human Rights Watch.

He said the EU has been funnelling billions to Egypt, conditioned on “concrete and credible steps” on human rights.

The exact wording of the agreement, which is published here, says that assistance to Egypt requires it “to make concrete and credible steps” towards respecting effective democracy, the rule of law, and guarantees respect for human rights.

“Egyptian authorities don’t seem to have read the memo. Lame statements like this one are hardly a reminder,” Francavilla said of the commission’s reaction.

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A revamped EU border force Frontex is set to have around 17,000 people involved in deportations at its disposal, while human-rights monitoring is narrowed and the agency’s ability to terminate operations in a member state over rights violations is weakened.

The overhaul, presented on Tuesday (27 October), follows months of speculation by a European Commission determined to give the Warsaw-based agency a more central role in the bloc’s deportations, as reported last week by EUobserver.

“The fundamental rights framework in Frontex is among the strongest in any EU agency, and that will stay also with this review,” Henna Virkkunen, a commission vice-president, told reporters.

“I’m not aware of any other border management authority with stronger protection anywhere in the world. I would actually say, and we’re not changing that. So this is pretty clear,” also said Magnus Brunner, the EU commissioner for migration.

But the claims, made at a press conference in Brussels, do not entirely match its 275-page proposal that it published only later on Tuesday evening.

Unable to scrutinise the text ahead of the press conference, reporters could only guess at what the proposal actually contained without being able to directly challenge the commissioners.

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Why are Europeans turning towards authoritarian and populist demagogues?

Last week, one study by two European think tanks said one-in-three Europeans would vote authoritarian or support a populist party. Among the reasons are the perceived elitism in the traditional left and right-leaning parties.

The centre appears to be eroding, leaving people who are struggling with high inflation, energy, and uncertain futures looking for answers elsewhere.

Opinion polling from the Pew Research Center also found that 69 percent of the French population is dissatisfied with democracy, Italy 62 percent, Poland 47 percent and Spain 68 percent.

All are facing upcoming elections.

Another study, out on Tuesday (27 October), by the US-based Action for Democracy, drew similar conclusions and found that shaky allegiances between far-right parties in Europe are creating the scaffolding for possible future leadership under an authoritarian bent.

I say shaky because populist far-right parties have a notorious track record of finding common ground but then falling apart later.

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The US and Israeli-led war with Iran, launched in late February, and other military campaigns in the region have disrupted flights, leaving around 5,500 deportations that would normally receive support from the EU’s border agency Frontex unexecuted.

The disruption comes despite the Warsaw-based agency’s recent announcement that returns rose in the first half of 2026, with Syrians and Iraqis among the 10 nationalities most frequently deported.

Internally, however, Frontex appears concerned.

In July, it highlighted return problems because of the Middle East crisis, a broad swathe of conflicts that has seen various airspace closures over Bahrain, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Lebanon, Israel, Qatar, Syria, and the UAE.

It said roughly 4,000 returns had not been carried out because of direct cancellations or broader operational standstills, with member states halting the organisation or scheduling of Frontex-supported returns due to the Middle East conflicts.

By 30 September, that figure had climbed to 5,500.

Although now open (as of publication), airspace restrictions, route availability and operational measures may be introduced, amended or lifted rapidly, sometimes with little notice.

European deportation setbacks typically involve everything from fragmented national systems, to people absconding, and to foreign states refusing to accept their own nationals. But war and conflict are now adding another layer of complications.

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An Egyptian national who sought protection in Italy after arriving on the island of Lampedusa in August may end up dealing a constitutional blow to the EU’s asylum laws after seeking legal counsel.

The Egyptian, who is not named, had his asylum claim rejected even though he did not understand his translator. His is appealing.

“Not even European Union law can conflict with our supreme principles,” his lawyer, Claudia Avenia told EUobserver earlier this week.

Aside from his own personal circumstances, his legal case is raising serious issues that could have a knock-on effect on the EU’s new asylum and migration pact, which kicked into force this past June across all 27 EU member states.

Because he is from Egypt, he was shuffled through a fast track asylum procedure. EU laws require the accelerated process from nationals who have a 20 percent chance or less of getting asylum in Europe. Egypt fits into this category.

A new EU law also meant that he was technically not yet legally inside the EU as authorities carried out health checks, identification and other assessments during a so-called pre-screening phase.

It means he was banned from stepping outside a reception centre, where he was being housed.

Lawyers describe it as the legal fiction of non-entry, similar in scope to certain areas of international airports. Rights experts had earlier warned, when the EU rules were being drafted, that this would lead to defacto detention.

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The EU’s border force Frontex is getting overhauled next Tuesday (27 October) by a European Commission determined to give the Warsaw-based agency a larger role in deportations, more resources, and more agility to deploy.

The Brussels-executive has already proposed increasing the agency’s budget to €12bn, spread out over seven years. The money is being discussed as part of a larger drawn out EU budget fight among EU states.

Budget tussles aside, the commission has already dropped clues into what it wants from the new agency, following demands from its political masters at the centre-right European People’s Party (EPP).

The EPP had wanted to expand the border force to 30,000 from the proposed 10,000. But it is unlikely the 30,000 will be met given the difficulty of finding recruits.

Frontex currently has around 1,250 officers, who are directly employed by the agency. Its standing corps also includes officers provided by member states on long- and short-term assignments. That means they are not all on the Frontex payroll.

European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen, ahead of this month’s EU summit, instead spoke of a “substantial increase” of the Frontex standing corps, without committing to a number.

She also called for European Border and Return Reserve, a Quick Reaction Force for crisis deployment, a Return Coordination Centre to accelerate and improve returns including from foreign states, and social media snooping to gauge any possible Ceuta-like mass arrivals.

The agency is also likely to get more personal data sharing powers with the EU police force Europol.

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Years ago I was flipping through the ads of a ‘Black Friday’ sale from a large US retailer, while visiting a relative in North Carolina. Amid the pens and pencils was a child’s school bag with a large neon printed unicorn surrounded by lollipops and or hearts.

It was bullet proof.

I can’t recall what caliber of bullet it promised to stop. But the same paper had a semi-automatic Bushmaster rifle for sale at only $549.99 [€490], which normally retails at almost $1,000. I snapped a photo of it.

A few years earlier, a Bushmaster had been used to gun down 20 small children at Sandy Hook Elementary. Most of them were only six-years old.

A Benenlli 12-gauge tactical shotgun was also on sale. Last week, five-year-old Rhoam Summer and two others, aged 8 and 11 were shot dead at a school in Oregon by a 16-year old with a shotgun.

I mention this as someone who grew up in the United States and went to school there but can’t identify with a normalisation of violence splashed out as one-off specials and deals ahead of Christmas, a holiday that is cynically meant to celebrate peace and kindness.

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The European Commission’s likely anti-asylum proposal to tackle sudden large arrivals may come before the end of the year, after warm endorsements by some 17 EU states during a breakfast on Friday (16 October) ahead of the second-day of the EU summit in Brussels.

Beyond the warm words, the discussions exposed a clear ambition among the 17 to give member states the power to close EU borders and temporarily and selectively suspend asylum applications, according to an EU diplomat.

Speaking on the condition of anonymity, the diplomat said there had been a lot of support for the so-called European emergency response framework, proposed by EU commission president Ursula von der Leyen during her State of the Union address last month.

Speculation on what exactly such a framework entails remains unclear, amid alarm among human rights defenders that the EU is seeking legal tools to curb asylum rights – echoing Polish temporary emergency measures that have suspended asylum registration along the Belarus border since March 2025.

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The European Commission says asylum seekers arriving at EU borders are now being screened, but it makes no mention of the independent rights monitors that EU law requires to oversee those procedures, even as spending on border surveillance surges.

“Screening of people arriving illegally and the border procedures are being carried out,” said European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen, in a letter addressed to the 27 heads of state and government meeting at an EU summit in Brussels on Thursday (15 October).

An annex to her letter, obtained by EUobserver, highlights broad outstanding issues when it comes to implementing new EU-wide asylum laws that kicked into force this past June.

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The EU is shying away from triggering rules that would shield people and companies working at or with the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague from US sanctions, preferring instead months-long diplomatic outreach.

The European Commission on Wednesday (14 October) told reporters in Brussels that it was doing everything to seek “practical solutions”, while hoping that its diplomacy will help the court, which prosecutes people for war crimes, genocide, and other atrocities.

“We haven’t made any decisions yet. But we continue to discuss at every level,” said a commission spokesperson, when pressed on whether a little-known blocking statue, which would presumably damper the impact of the US sanctions, remains an option.

And an EU summit in Brussels on Thursday is expected to ask the US to reverse the decision, according to draft conclusions seen by EUobserver.

The EU’s little-known “blocking statute” would prevent EU companies and banks from complying with the sanctions. It was first used against US sanctions on Cuba, Iran and Libya.

The Trump administration had, last Friday, announced financial sanctions on the ICC as part of a larger assault to dismantle the court, after it issued arrest warrants for Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, its former defence minister Yoav Gallant, and Hamas military commander Mohammed Deif.

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The European Commission is promising more support to Egypt, even as Egyptian warplanes reportedly bomb in Sudan and authorities carry out a campaign of violence against the refugees it hosts.

The civil war in Sudan includes reports of genocide, chemical-weapons use, mass rape, and starvation, forcing some 1.2 million Sudanese people into Egypt, which was described as a priority migration-busting partner by commission president Ursula von der Leyen on Tuesday (13 October), who also promised continuing support for Cairo.

In a letter sent to the 27 heads of state and government ahead of an EU summit on Thursday in Brussels, she spoke of “offering protection and durable solutions in … host countries”, as well as further aid for Sudanese people who had returned to parts of the country, now deemed relatively safe.

But her warm words stand in sharp contrast to internal EU documents on Sudan, released by the London-based group Statewatch earlier this month, and which speak of an Egyptian-led campaign of violence against the Sudanese it is tasked to help.

“The Egyptian authorities have continued arbitrary arrests, detention and deportation campaign against migrants, asylum seekers and refugees, with a sharp escalation of forced deportations being observed since January 2026,” said the Irish EU presidency, in an internal document written in September.

Estimates suggest Egypt hosts over nine million migrants and refugees.

Some 80 percent are Sudanese, Syrian, Yemeni, and Libyan nationals. Of those, just over 1 million are officially registered as refugees. Most come from Sudan.

And Egypt’s crackdown also comes amid a massive 74 percent funding cut for the UN’s refugee agency in the country, even as the EU’s financial support to Cairo increases, already totalling €5bn.

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Money and how to make more of it are among the top issues to be discussed among EU leaders as they gather for a two-day summit in Brussels, while they also struggle with ongoing problems on Ukraine, the Middle East, migration, defence, and new rules for EU-hopefuls, such as Montenegro.

The official talks kick off on Thursday (15 October) on how to make the 27 EU states more competitive in a turbulent world dominated by US tariffs, Chinese innovation, and Iran-war linked chokeholds in the Strait of Hormuz, which have forced the G7 wealthy nations to release 100m barrels of diesel and crude oil.

Gas prices have risen by 140 percent since the end of February with imported fossil fuels now costing an extra €100bn, says the European Commission.

In Europe, a grand scheme, a so-called “One Europe, One Market”, aims to spike European fortunes by saving an estimated €37.5bn for EU businesses by 2029.

The drive is part of a larger initiative to cut red tape and remove internal market barriers, including the eventual launch of a so-called EU Inc.

Ireland, which is currently steering the EU’s rotating presidency, had already announced that the summit would start with the competitiveness theme. And leaked draft conclusions, seen by EUobserver, lead with a sales pitch to step up ambitions over the ‘One Europe, One Market’ proposal.

It also gives a nod to the German car industry, by citing efforts needed to stop China from making too much money off Europeans. The goal is to get Europeans to spend more on European products, even if they are more expensive and less innovative.

The ‘more money’ talks dovetail into how to spend it (or not) in the EU’s next long-term budget, spanning 2028 to 2034.

António Costa, the president of the European Council, is hoping for an agreement of the nearly €2 trillion budget before the end of the year. People need predictability and stability, he said, in a invitation letter sent to the 27 EU states.

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The EU’s border agency, Frontex, shared coordinates of an overcrowded and partly deflated boat in the Mediterranean sea with the Libyan coastguard and then watched them run it over.

The boat was carrying 27 people, including children.

The findings, by Frontex’s own fundamental rights officer, described an incident that took place on 19 June 2026.

And this was just a tiny part of a wider pattern of violence by the EU-backed Libyan coastguard, which has also shot at or near civil rescue vessels.

No one was killed in the June event. But people were tossed into the water. Others, pulled onto the Libyan vessel, were then beaten by Libyan uniformed officers.

Frontex had issued a Mayday relay and then shared the sightings by email with the Libyan rescue centre.

No vessels were reported to be in the vicinity, but the Libyans showed up 90 minutes later.

The internal Frontex findings highlight ongoing tensions in the agency over sharing rescue coordinates with the Libyans in the name of saving lives.

“Saving lives is the absolute sort of absolute right that people have,” Hans Leijtens the agency’s director, told EUobserver earlier this year.

“And it’s our job to contribute to that, and if that sort of starts with looking at which part of the Mediterranean ship is sailing, and if it’s a north African country, we all have to inform the authorities there,” he added.

But his own rights officer also notes that the botched rescue on 19 June amounted to a violation of the right to life, citing article six of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.

He says the standard is not simply whether the migrants were ultimately rescued, but if the operation was planned and executed to minimise risks to human life.

In this case, the Libyans violated that right among others, he says. Frontex did not reply to the findings in the report, as of publication.

Let the court decide

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Twelve years ago, EU summit leaders announced they had a strategy to tackle unprecedented migrant arrivals.

Next week, they will meet again in Brussels and to tell us something similar.

We journalists will report on the latest twists and turns, hoping to get some sort of angle that hasn’t been covered. But the reality is that our leaders have broadly failed.

Dozens of EU summit conclusions have been published since 2015, when one around million Syrians arrived in Europe to seek protection.

We need stronger external borders to preserve the Schengen passport-free zone, they said. We need partnerships with foreign states to save lives. We need to step up deportations. We need a European solution.

All of these ideas and strategies have found a home in council conclusions, in various iterations, since 2015. All of them.

Some have actually panned out, including an EU migrant swap deal with Turkey and other deals with autocrats in Tunisia, Egypt and elsewhere. Others like internal reforms on asylum have also been delivered.

Yet the sense of urgency to tackle these issues continues because there is an obvious disconnect between what has been delivered, the promises made and the lived experience on the ground.

People still come. Some 80,000 arrived in the Spanish enclave of Ceuta end of July alone.

Many are still fleeing violence, war and economic hardships. Others are lured by the promise of labour in Europe by Europeans willing to exploit them.

I remember meeting a group of boys from Bangladesh on the Ocean Viking, freshly rescued in the middle of the night, asking when they would be able to start working in Italy.

One of them was still shaking with fear and sobbing, following a near death experience.

The European Commission is now claiming that the drop of irregular arrivals is due to their migration policy reforms, as if the fall of the murderous Assad regime in Syria had no discernible impact.

Perhaps some of that is true. But there is no disputing that Syrians accounted for over 100,000 irregular crossings in 2023, a year before Assad fell. It then dropped to around 6,000. Today, it is around 1,000, according to Frontex.

At some point, one has to wonder if these conclusions, repeated ad nauseam, is nothing but political theatre by a leadership that has run out of ideas.

EU leaders meeting next week in Brussels for the usual post-summer European Council are rehashing conclusions on migration, echoing almost word-for-word statements since at least 2015.

“The European Council has developed a strategy aimed at stemming the unprecedented migratory flows Europe is facing,” they announced in December 2015, following a summit.

“It is indispensable to regain control over the external borders,” they also said, noting the perceived threat to the EU’s internal border-free Schengen zone.

And they voiced fear over the low number of deportations, insisting on “concrete measures to ensure the actual return and readmission of people not authorised to stay.”

Eeleven years later and the 15 October summit in Brussels next week is now asking almost the same thing, including to what extent previous conclusions on migration have been implemented.

Although draft conclusions can change, and likely will, the current wording essentially repeats the same demands spanning over 50 EU summits since at least 2015, when over a million Syrians entered Europe to seek protection.

Out of the 52 published conclusions since 2015, over half dealt with migration in some shape or form. The latest draft dated 5 October and seen by EUobserver is among those.

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Two human rights defenders are facing a Greek court in Rhodes and 20 years in jail over allegations they belong to a criminal organisation.

The hearing targets Norwegian activist Tommy Olsen and Panayote Dimitras, a legal administrator and representative of the NGO Greek Helsinki Monitor.

“They want to shut me up because what I’ve been doing over the last six to seven years is revealing their wrongdoings,” Olsen told EUobserver on Monday (5 October).

The hearing, which is taking place on Tuesday, is years in the making, following repeated attempt by Greek authorities to punish the pair for helping people seek asylum on the island of Kos in 2021.

Both deny any wrongdoing and Amnesty International earlier this year said the two were being prosecuted for their human-rights work of documenting serious rights violations.

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The sharp drop in irregular migrant arrivals is evidence that the EU’s policy reforms are working, EU migration commissioner, Magnus Brunner, said on Thursday (1 October).

But Syria is also no longer the single biggest source of asylum claims after the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s regime 22 months ago, a factor that appears to have been conveniently ignored.

On Thursday, he told reporters after a meeting of EU interior ministers in Luxembourg that irregular arrivals have dropped 55 percent in the past two years.

“So that’s a record low in the asylum applications,” said the former Austrian finance minister, adding that Austria and Sweden have recorded equally low asylum numbers and that Germany is deporting more people than are asking for protection.

“The basis for all of that, and the foundation for all of that, is the pact, the pact on migration and asylum,” he said, in comments that were echoed by Ireland’s migration minister, Jim O’Callaghan.

The pact, spanning a mix of complex regulations, was launched in June. Despite having two years to prepare for the launch, its implementation remains patchy.

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