By Silvia Carta

In 2024, PICUM’s media monitoring confirmed a growing trend: at least 142 individuals faced criminal or administrative proceedings for acting in solidarity with migrants in the EU. Additionally, our media monitoring found that at least 91 migrants were subjected to criminalisation, mostly under counter-smuggling legislation. But we know that this number is an undercount, as other organisations recorded many more cases1 in their own work. Furthermore, news articles highlighted several forms of non-judicial harassment directed at human rights defenders and civil society organisations within the EU. Due to the significant gap in statistical and official public data2 regarding individuals accused, charged, or convicted for smuggling and related offenses, this briefing relies on a media alert system and desk research, which may not comprehensively capture all relevant incidents reported across EU countries. Consequently, the figures presented likely underestimate the true extent of such occurrences. In addition, it is likely that many cases, particularly regarding people who are migrants, go unreported by the media.3 Beyond the continuously high number of people who have been criminalised in 2024, this report highlights different trends. Under the current legal system, charges of facilitation and smuggling can be used to criminalise migrants or people without regular residence and those acting in solidarity with them. Despite numerous and protracted judicial proceedings, actual convictions remain low. This report also looks at the several cases of people and organisations across Europe that have experienced non-judicial harassment. Moreover, the findings of our media monitoring in 2024 seek to shed light on the criminalisation of people crossing borders irregularly, which has grown of at least 20% in comparison to monitoring in 2023,4 but remains a relatively hidden phenomenon. A comparison between PICUM’s findings and existing research reveals a tendency for the media to underreport the criminalisation of migrants.5 Yet, the majority of cases analysed by PICUM align with research indicating that migrants, including children, often face unfounded accusations, endure harsh legal processes and face years of pre-trial detention for the sole fact of migrating   

Brussels: PICUM, 2025. 29p.

By Human Rights Watch

  Over the last year, over half a million people have crossed the Darién Gap, a swampy jungle between Colombia and Panama, on their journey north, often to the United States. Venezuelans, Haitians, and Ecuadorians, but also people from other regions like Asia and Africa, risk their lives in this difficult terrain. “This Hell Was My Only Option”: Abuses Against Migrants and Asylum Seekers Pushed to Cross the Darién Gap, the first in a series of Human Rights Watch reports on migration via the Darién Gap, documents how a lack of safe and legal pathways has pushed migrants and asylum seekers fleeing human rights crises in Latin America to cross the Darién Gap. Data analyzed in the report suggests restrictions on movement to Mexico and Central America, often promoted by the US government, have contributed to sharp increases in the number of people crossing the Darién Gap, exposing them to abuses, including rape, and empowering organized crime in the area. Whether seeking international protection or economic opportunities, asylum seekers and migrants deserve safe, orderly, and dignified paths to make their claims or to offer their skills. In all cases, they are entitled to safety and respect for their human rights during their journey.   

New York: Human Rights Watch, 2023. 68p.

Edited by Lorenzo Guadagno and Lisette R. Robles

Forced population movements are a defining feature of almost any humanitarian crisis, shaping the design, targeting, and delivery of emergency responses. This book investigates how the evolving situation of different forced migrants is accounted for and addressed in humanitarian action in order to improve their access to support and assistance. Bringing together case studies from Africa, Asia, Europe, and the Pacific, this book focuses on a diversity of operational modalities and types of assistance provided by both traditional and non-traditional humanitarian actors to address the specific needs of displaced children, women, people with disabilities and older people, as well as trafficked migrant workers. This book adopts a broad perspective on humanitarian action, acknowledging how its boundaries are challenged and expanded in forced migration contexts. Its operational and theoretical insights will be useful for a range of readers, from humanitarian and migration researchers and students to practitioners and policymakers.

London and New York: Routledge, 2025. 205p.

By European Border and Coast Guard Agency (Frontex)

The following scenarios are based mainly on Serious Incidents Reports received by the Frontex' Fundamental Rights Office, concerning violations that allegedly took place at border areas where the Agency is operating. All cases refer to situations where third country nationals are under the jurisdiction of the authorities of the host state participating in a joint activity. In 2022-23, the Fundamental Rights Office launched approximately 100 Serious Incident Reports related to fundamental rights, matching the scenarios outlined below. This indicates that they represent potential violations of a widespread nature. Outlined scenarios, regardless of the direct or indirect involvement of Frontex staff and/or assets, may negatively impact the Agency and have potential legal implications, including for the broader European Border and Coast Guard community and respective national authorities. Active involvement by participants in joint activities in practices presented below, such as collective expulsions, amounts to a violation of EU and international law as well as a breach of the Frontex Code of Conduct. To ensure Frontex' full compliance with fundamental rights, it is necessary that the Agency makes clear to all operational participants that practices and policies as the ones described below are in violation of EU and international law and may result in Frontex' disengagement, triggering of Article 46 of the European Border and Coast Guard Regulation, or other forms of administrative, financial and operational consequences. Frontex' Fundamental Rights Office recognises that similar cases often form part of broader systemic issues, identified through its monitoring. The Office is mandated to provide recommendations to the Agency, relevant also for national authorities. The following scenarios are complementary to these efforts and aim to provide basic guidance for officers deployed at the borders as well as other staff tasked with related duties. Seven different scenarios of fundamental rights violations are briefly presented. While presented scenarios have been developed on the basis of most frequently alleged violations, it is important to note that this is a non-exhaustive list. While this document includes basic references to violated rights, it is not intended to be a legal analysis. Outside of the official border crossing point. based on real-life Serious Incident Reports (SIR) Category 1, and includes a list of potentially violated rights. The last section of the document outlines "dos" and "don'ts" for border guards in case of witnessing or learning about similar cases in the performance of their duties.

Warsaw • Poland : European Border and Coast Guard Agency (Frontex), 2024 . 16p

By Chris Horwood and Bram Frouws

Almost 10 months after damning human rights reports and global publicity exposed Saudi Arabian state-driven border killings of migrants – labelled by Human Rights Watch as possible crimes against humanity - the deaths and injuries continue. New evidence appears to indicate that the Saudi border authorities at their southern border with Yemen are continuing to use live weapons to fire indiscriminately at Ethiopians and Yemenis crossing the border irregularly. This update report argues that while the crimes being committed are murderous and grievous, the level of inaction and impunity in the face of global exposure and condemnation should also disturb us all.

London/Denmark: Mixed Migration Centre, 2024. 9p.

By Cecilia Menjívar

Stumpf and Manning’s Article, Liminal Immigration Law, explains the origin, mechanisms, and persistence of liminal laws in three cases they analyze: DACA, immigration detainers, and administrative closure. Their analysis unearths key similarities across these cases: the “stickiness” and robustness of liminal rules, their transitory nature, and their flexibility in contrast to the inflexibility of traditional law. This Essay expands Stumpf and Manning’s analysis by considering social science scholarship on the legal production of legal statuses. It examines the liminal case of Temporary Protected Status to capture the effects of liminality on the ground for individuals and families, the power of liminal rules as an instrument of immigration control and governance, and the key role of racialization practices in the creation, interpretation, and implementation of liminal rules. The conceptual extension in this Essay exemplifies how the analytic lens that Stumpf and Manning propose will prove generative for legal, socio-legal, and social science scholarship more generally.  

  IOWA LAW REVIEW ONLINE,  Vol. 110:51 2024, 16 p.

By Lydia Morris

This book explores the concept of civic stratification and examines its contemporary relevance for analysis and understanding of the functioning of rights in society. David Lockwood’s (1996) concept of civic stratification outlines how the rights associated with citizenship can be a source of inequality by their formal granting or denial by the state, or by informal impediments to their full realization. The purpose of this book is to explore the meaning and significance of this concept and elaborate on its potential to offer a framework for understanding the dynamic nature of rights. Lockwood’s model reverses Marshall’s (1950) view of citizenship as guaranteed inclusion in society and is linked to the way that the differential entitlement and the qualifying conditions associated with certain rights can be harnessed as a means of control. While both Marshall and Lockwood were principally concerned with the rights attached to citizenship, this book extends the insights of these two authors to show how such controls apply in various ways to both citizens and non-citizens alike. Building on Lockwood’s conception of ‘moral resources’ the book sets out a theoretical framework and empirical illustration of how the position of different groups within society is subject to shifting perceptions of social worth and is engaged both in claims to fuller access to rights and in justifications of their denial or removal. This book will appeal to scholars and higher-level students with relevant interests in sociolegal studies, sociology, social policy, and politics. 

Abingdon, Oxon, UK: New York: Routledge, 2025. 125p.