The Ombudsman has opened an own-initiative inquiry into how the European Commission intends to guarantee respect for human rights in the context of the EU-Tunisia Memorandum of Understanding (MoU). The inquiry follows on from a strategic initiative into the same issue.

The Ombudsman highlighted concerns about the absence of a prior human rights impact assessment, notably related to the 'Migration and mobility' pillar of the MoU and the actions foreseen under that pillar. She asked the Commission to reply to a series of questions about how it intends to monitor the human rights impact of actions under the MoU and what measures it has foreseen, including with regard to the possible suspension of EU funding, if human rights violations are identified.

The Ombudsman found that the Commission had adopted a document setting out how to assess the human rights impact of projects under the MoU, and introduced measures to monitor human rights compliance. However, the Commission failed to make this information public. The Ombudsman made suggestions for improvement to address this. The Ombudsman also suggested that the Commission elaborate concrete criteria setting out how it would suspend EU-funded contracts related to migration management where it finds evidence of human rights violations by recipients of funds (contractors). In this context, she further suggested that the Commission encourage its implementing partners under the MoU to set up complaint mechanisms where individuals can report alleged violations of their human rights.