Flight from Ukraine: A Proposal for Transition out of the EU Temporary Protection Scheme

Professor Kees Groenendijk, Radboud University, Emeritus and Professor Elspeth Guild, University of Liverpool Photo credit: Dietmar Rabich / Wikimedia Commons / “Münster, Stadtweinhaus, Beflaggung Ukraine und EU -- 2022 -- 0219” / CC BY-SA 4.0 On 3 March 2022 the EU legislator, for the first time, opened a temporary protection scheme under Directive 2001/55 for those fleeing the Russian invasion of Ukraine. While the Directive limits the duration of any scheme to three years maximum, the EU legislator has already extended the scheme to five years and is currently reflecting on where to go next. The validity of the extra extension has already been considered by Peers, Ineli-Ciger and others and for the moment the Court of Justice has yet to be asked. In the meantime, the war in Ukraine continues. Some have assessed that at the current rate of progress, it would take Russia centuries and tens of millions of deaths to succeed in occupying Ukraine. It seems that Ukrainian attacks in…