Area of freedom, security and justice

According to Article 3 of the Treaty on European Union, which sets out the European Union’s (EU) objectives, the EU offers its citizens an area of freedom, security and justice (AFSJ) without internal frontiers. This is an area in which the free movement of persons is ensured in conjunction with appropriate measures with respect to external border controls, asylum, immigration and preventing and combating crime.

An entire section of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU), Title V (Articles 67-89), is devoted to the EU’s area of freedom, security and justice. It contains general rules (Articles 67-76), as well as specific chapters concerning:

policies on border checks, asylum and immigration
judicial cooperation in civil matters
judicial cooperation in criminal matters
police cooperation.

Article 67 TFEU states that the EU seeks to ensure a high level of security through measures to prevent and combat crime, racism and xenophobia, and through coordination and cooperation measures between police and judicial authorities and other competent authorities, as well as through the mutual recognition of judgments in criminal matters and, if necessary, through the approximation of EU Member States’ criminal laws.

Because many security challenges come from outside the EU or are of a cross-border nature, individual Member States are not always best equipped to address them. Article 68 TFEU gives the European Council the responsibility of drawing up the strategic guidelines for legislative and operational planning within the area of freedom, security and justice. However, Member States remain responsible for maintaining law and order and safeguarding their internal security.

Article 83 TFEU gives the European Parliament and the Council the right to draw up minimum rules defining criminal offences for particularly serious crimes with a cross-border dimension, resulting from the nature or impact of such offences or from a special need to combat them on a common basis. The crimes in question are:

terrorism;
human trafficking and the sexual exploitation of women and children;
illicit drug and arms trafficking;
money laundering;
corruption;
counterfeiting of means of payment;
computer crime;
organised crime.

The EU security union strategy, which runs for the 2020-2025 period, addresses these crimes.