News

Indian Minister of External Affairs Dr Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, European Commission Executive Vice-President Henna Virkkunen, and ICMPD Director General Susanne Raab launched the European Legal Gateway Office in India on 18 February 2026.

ICMPD is supporting the European Union in the European Legal Gateway Office in India. The new project was launched yesterday to facilitate the mobility of Indian ICT professionals, students, and researchers to the EU; strengthen the India-EU cooperation; and as well as to enable economic benefits for both India and Europe. Indian Minister of External Affairs Dr Subrahmanyam Jaishankar and European Commission Executive Vice-President Henna Virkkunen led the launch, with ICMPD Director General Susanne Raab.

Director General Susanne Raab met with Swedish Minister for Migration HE Johan Forssell in Stockholm in January, capping Sweden’s successful 2025 Chairmanship of ICMPD’s Steering Group. They discussed the ongoing cooperation along migration routes and with partner countries, return and reintegration, and the EU Pact for Migration and Asylum. As the Director General’s first visit to Sweden, the mission also sets the foundation for continued high-level dialogue and future collaboration aligned with ICMPD’s Strategy 2030.

On 6 February 2026, ICMPD supported a session of Moldova’s National Joint Risk Analysis Working Group in Chisinau, bringing together the l​aw enforcement community to review activities carried out in 2025 and to plan analytical priorities for 2026.

Switzerland takes on the 2026 Chairmanship of the Rabat Process, with a commitment to fostering constructive dialogue among countries of origin, transit, and destination, while actively engaging civil society, non-governmental and international organisations, the private sector, and youth. The handover of the Chairmanship from Nigeria took place at the Senior Officials Meeting in Abuja on 28-29 January 2026.

ICMPD Director General Susanne Raab met with Poland’s Secretary of State, Mr Czesław Mroczek, on 27 January 2026 in Warsaw. The meetings focused on current national and regional migration dynamics, including external EU border and security-linked pressures; the situation of Ukrainians in Poland; and ways to elevate ICMPD–Poland cooperation. This was also Ms Raab’s first visit to an ICMPD Member State, since assuming office as new Director General this month. 

European Union and international partners, government representatives, civil society organisations, gathered in Dushanbe in December for a high-level briefing to strengthen long-term reintegration support systems for returning migrants in Tajikistan. Discussions centred on the multifaceted reintegration landscape in Tajikistan, highlighting the need for more coherent, predictable, and sustainable support for returning Tajik nationals.

The fraudulent use of identity and travel documents can facilitate transnational criminal activities, including human trafficking and migrant smuggling – particularly when people move across borders undetected. This has been endemic and poses a persistent threat to regional security across West Africa.

In 2025, EU Member States recorded a 26% decrease in irregular arrivals and a 21% decrease in asylum applications. It is the first marked decline in these figures in many years, and the International Centre for Migration Policy Development’s (ICMPD) Migration Outlook report, released today, says that this should provide momentum to the EU’s Asylum and Migration Pact implementation.

ICMPD Director General Susanne Raab met with HE Mr Vincenzo Mascioli, State Secretary for Migration of Switzerland on 13 January 2026. The meeting reaffirmed the strong partnership with Switzerland, a founding ICMPD Member State and long-standing strategic partner, and provided an opportunity to exchange views on key migration challenges in Europe and beyond. Discussions focused on Switzerland’s migration priorities and ICMPD’s strategic direction for 2026; and key areas of cooperation including Ukraine, the expansion of the Migration Resource Centres, and the Swiss Chairmanship of the Rabat Process in 2026.

ICMPD Director General Susanne Raab met with HE Minister of Interior of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), Mr Rebar Ahmad, to sign a Cooperation Agreement in strengthening strategic engagement in the areas of migration management, reintegration, and capacity building.

Susanne Raab joins the International Centre for Migration Policy Development as Director General, effective 1 January 2026.

Migrant smuggling and human trafficking are among the most complex and urgent challenges shaping mobility between Africa and Europe. Both crimes are highly adaptive, continuously evolving in response to political, economic, and technological shifts. They thrive on structural inequalities and systemic vulnerabilities fuelled by conflict, socio-economic disparities, discrimination, human rights violations, governance gaps, political instability, and climate shocks. As these conditions intensify globally, they expand both the number of people at risk and the geographic scope where victimization and exploitation can occur.

ICMPD commemorates this year’s International Migrants Day, ten years after the so-called migration crisis of 2015, an event that has left profound marks on the political and social landscape of Europe and its neighbouring regions. The crisis and a series of subsequent events shifted discourses and posed growing challenges that called for agility and innovation in policy responses.

Three regional migration Dialogues are further strengthening the responses to human trafficking and migrant smuggling across African and European routes. The Khartoum, Rabat, and Niamey Processes marked an important milestone in interregional cooperation to enhance policies and cooperation to align with realities on the ground, ensuring that responses to these crimes remain fit for purpose.