Brussels Mission

Ralph Genetzke

Director ICMPD Brussels Mission

About the Mission

The Brussels Mission is ICMPD’s second largest office with currently 70 staff members. It was set up as a permanent structure in 2007 and a Seat Agreement with the Kingdom of Belgium was signed in May 2008.

The Mission in Brussels acts as a link between the organisation’s work with partner countries and the EU, allowing its experience in cooperation to feed back into EU policy. It ensures coordination and liaison with EU Institutions, ICMPD and EU Member State representations, diplomatic missions and other organisations or institutions relevant to ICMPD's work.

The Brussels Mission is key to ICMPD’s contribution to the European policy debate on migration and asylum issues. The Policy and Strategic Partnerships Unit coordinates the organisation of events such as expert roundtables and targeted conferences. It also monitors and analyses policy developments in the EU in order to feed information back to relevant staff and units across the organisation.

The Global Initiatives under the Brussels Mission currently comprise four projects:

The joint EU-ICMPD MIgration EU eXpertise (MIEUX+) Initiative enables institutions and experts to exchange knowledge on migration since 2009. MIEUX+ is active in over 120 countries and supports regional organisations, national ministries, local authorities, judicial actors, and civil society organisations in improving migration governance and management through capacity development.

The Mobility Partnership Facility (MPF) is an EU-funded initiative, implemented by ICMPD. The programme seeks to strengthen cooperation between EU Member States and partner countries across a broad range of migration-related themes aligned to the New Pact on Migration & Asylum, including labour mobility pilots, dialogue on migration, projects that build capacity for migration management and those that maximise the development impact of migration.

The European Union Global Diaspora Facility (EUDiF) is the first EU-funded project to take a global approach to diaspora engagement. The pilot project fosters an informed, inclusive and impactful ‘diaspora-development ecosystem’ by supporting partner countries, diaspora organisations in the EU, the EU and its Member States to engage and collaborate more effectively with each other. EUDiF’s activities centre around knowledge, dialogue and mainstreaming diaspora expertise for development through capacity development and technical support.

Under the assignment ‘Training for Development-Oriented Migration’, ICMPD (as part of a Consortium) provides a Technical Assistant Team (TAT) to support the GIZ ‘Programme Migration and Diaspora’ (PMD) and its component ‘Migration Governance’ (MiGov). The TAT formulates and carries out tailor-made training programmes in the field of development-oriented migration policy in eight partner countries: Albania, Columbia, Ecuador, Georgia, Ghana, Indonesia, Kosovo and Serbia.

In addition, the Brussels Mission hosts several project teams and focal points with regional and thematic expertise:

The European Return and Reintegration Network (ERRIN) is a joint reintegration initiative driven by European Member States under the leadership of the Netherlands. Through facilitating collaboration between migration authorities, ERRIN explores collaborative solutions to foster the efficiency of the return process and the quality of reintegration support. Most importantly, it strives to improve future perspectives for returnees to start a new life back home through joint contracting of service partners in the countries of return. ERRIN also serves as an ‘innovation hub’ for its members to improve practices, share learning and pilot new approaches to return and reintegration. The programme will reach the end of its funding cycle in June 2022. The knowledge and experience accumulated over the past years of ERRIN’s existence will be transferred to the European Border and Coast Guard Agency (EBCGA/Frontex) as a foundation of the upcoming Frontex Reintegration Programme.

The support project to the Africa-EU Migration and Mobility Dialogue (MMD) aims at creating a meaningful partnership on migration cooperation between the two continents. As part of the MMD, the secretariat of the Rabat Process is located in Brussels. The MMD supports migration dialogues, provides capacity building, and works towards strengthening the role of the African diaspora.

The India-EU Cooperation and Dialogue on Migration and Mobility (India-EU CDMM) project team and Country Coordinator for India support the implementation of the EU-India Common Agenda on Migration and Mobility (CAMM). In addition, the Silk Routes Liaison (for ICMPD activities in South and West Asia) facilitates the exchange of information between ICMPD and the EU institutions, EU Member States, their respective capitals, and Silk Routes countries’ diplomatic representations (Afghanistan, Bangladesh, India, Iraq, Iran, Sri Lanka, Pakistan) in Brussels.

With the help of the Border Management and Security Programme’s Senior Advisor assigned to the Mission, ICMPD actively supports further evolvement of the Integrated Border Management (IBM)-related concept – notably through actions implemented within the Brussels-based global initiatives MIEUX+ and MPF, as well as through regional dialogues like the Rabat Process. With the presence of its Advisor, who serves also as Liaison Officer with donors and Member States, the Mission also strengthened its involvement in policy development in the field of border management.

Testament to the decentralised position of the Brussels Mission, the Resources Management Unit (RMU) is responsible for the planning, budgeting and financial reporting of the Brussels-based projects as well as cost monitoring and administrative control.

Contact

International Centre for Migration Policy Development
Rue Belliard 159
1040 Brussels, Belgium
T: +32 2 233 11 60
F: +32 2 231 14 30

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