Over 40 NGOs across Europe call for a just, dignified, and anti-racist approach to migration governance in Europe

Joint Statement – Brussels, 18 December 2025

Across Europe, migration is increasingly governed by racism, exclusion, and punitive control. Policies presented as “management” or “security” systematically criminalise migrants, normalise detention, deportation, and pushbacks, and reproduce racialised hierarchies that strip people of rights and dignity.

This International Migrants Day, a broad coalition of civil society organisations comes together to denounce the racialisation and criminalisation embedded in Europe’s migration governance. Migration is not an emergency or a threat, but a fundamental human reality that demands justice, care, and accountability.

In this statement, we call on European institutions, Member States, and societies to fundamentally shift direction: away from racialised and securitised migration policies and toward approaches rooted in anti-racism, solidarity, and respect for human rights. We outline a vision for a Europe that recognises mobility as a shared responsibility and centres the dignity, agency, and participation of migrants and racialised communities.

Read the full statement below and join us in reclaiming migration as a question of rights, justice, and shared humanity.