Mobility Phase: Polish Association for Legal Intervention, Warsaw | Amsterdam Centre for Migration and Refugee Law
Beyond the ‘Hybrid Threat’ Paradigm: EU-Belarus Border Crisis and the Erosion of Asylum-Seeker Rights in a Comparative Perspective
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Dr. Aleksandra Ancite-Jepifánova (born 1986) is an interdisciplinary legal scholar specialising in conflict, displacement, and human rights, with a particular focus on migration and asylum. She holds a PhD in Law from Queen Mary University of London and was a re:constitution Fellow in 2022/23. Her research combines doctrinal legal analysis with fieldwork and draws on nearly two decades of professional experience across diverse legal and regional contexts, including the UK, Germany, Eastern Europe, and the Kurdistan Region of Iraq. She has taught and held research positions at institutions including the London School of Economics (LSE), Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, King’s College London, and the CEU Democracy Institute (Rule of Law Clinic). Her re:constitution project formed part of a broader research agenda critically examining the concept of migrant instrumentalisation in European law, with particular attention to practices at the EU’s external borders with Belarus and Russia. This work integrates legal analysis with fieldwork conducted in Poland, Latvia, and Lithuania, including interviews with lawyers, volunteers, and people on the move from the MENA region. The research has resulted in a wide range of publications and is currently being consolidated in her forthcoming book, Rethinking Migrant Instrumentalisation: Law and Politics of Refugee Exclusion at the EU’s Eastern Borders.
Beyond the ‘Hybrid Threat’ Paradigm: EU-Belarus Border Crisis and the Erosion of Asylum-Seeker Rights in a Comparative Perspective
Throughout the second half of 2021, the situation at the EU’s external border with Belarus had continuously remained one of the topics dominating the European public and political agenda. In response to the rising numbers of asylum-seekers trying to cross into the EU from Belarus, three EU Member States – Poland, Latvia and Lithuania – declared a state of emergency on the Belarus border and introduced changes to domestic asylum legislation. In the local media and political discourses, the issue has been widely framed as a security threat and a ‘hybrid attack’ orchestrated by Minsk. The legislation adopted in Poland, Latvia and Lithuania comes into considerable tension with the EU asylum acquis and international law, particularly where it concerns access to the asylum procedure and the compliance with the non-refoulement principle. Although the three Member States have reacted to the perceived crisis in a similar manner, their responses have not been identical. The present study aims to systematically examine the relevant legislative measures imposed and their practical implications for the non-EU nationals involved from a comparative perspective. It will also access the EU-level response to the events at the border and its wider implications for the rule of law in the EU.
