Amid human rights criticism, the Egyptian government issued on Monday the executive regulations of the asylum law, which was passed in December 2024, more than a year beyond the deadline set by the law itself, which is also generating controversy and human rights criticism.
The law, passed in December 2024 as Egypt’s first legislative framework regulating asylum procedures, required the government to issue its executive regulations within six months of the date it came into force. However, the regulations were delayed by approximately a year and were published in the Official Gazette in late May.
Egypt hosts more than 1.1 million registered refugees and asylum seekers with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), as debate intensifies over a law that gradually transfers the management of the asylum file from the UNHCR to a permanent government committee, alongside human rights concerns over the absence of public consultation on the legislation and the delayed disclosure of details regarding its implementation mechanisms during the transitional period.
The new regulations stipulate that the Ministry of the Interior is the competent authority for implementing the provisions of the law through the Permanent Committee for Refugee Affairs. The regulations set out definitions of refugees and asylum seekers, identified priority groups for care, including persons with disabilities, the elderly, pregnant women, and unaccompanied children, as well as victims of human trafficking, torture, and sexual violence.
The regulations devoted special provisions to unaccompanied children, defined as foreigners under the age of 18 who are separated from their parents or relatives and are not in the care of a legally responsible adult. Competent authorities are required to consider the best interests of the child and to avoid exposing them to harm, to appoint a legal representative if they have none, to work toward family tracing and reunification where possible, or to provide long-term alternative care arrangements in coordination with the Ministry of Social Solidarity.
The regulations set out mechanisms for examining asylum applications. The competent committee is granted six months to rule on applications submitted by persons who entered the country through regular channels, while the period extends to one year for those who entered irregularly. Grounds for rejecting applications are limited to specific cases, including the repeated submission of an application without new evidence, the applicant benefiting from protection in another country, the absence of serious grounds for fear of persecution, the submission of forged documents, or the disappearance of the circumstances on which the asylum application was based.
The regulations grant asylum seekers the right to appeal decisions issued against them within 15 days of notification, with the appeal to be decided within 30 days, and allow for challenge before the Administrative Court of the State Council. The regulations also guarantee refugees a number of basic rights, including access to preventive and primary curative healthcare services in accordance with the rules applied to Egyptian citizens, facilitated enrolment of children in basic education, and priority processing and examination for priority groups, with legal assistance provided where necessary.
Should an application be accepted, the competent committee issues a reasoned decision granting refugee status, notifies the applicant, and issues them a refugee document. Conversely, the regulations allow for the termination of application examination procedures if the applicant explicitly withdraws it or if it is deemed implicitly withdrawn due to failure to follow up on procedures, including failure to submit required documents, absence from interviews without acceptable excuse, or failure to respond to committee correspondence for more than six months.
The regulations also impose a number of obligations on asylum seekers throughout the examination of their applications, including attendance at appointments set by the committee, notification of the committee prior to leaving the country and upon return, reporting of any changes to their personal, legal, professional, or health circumstances, notification of any change in nationality or the obtaining of international protection from another country, and reporting of any criminal proceedings initiated against them inside Egypt.
Security Powers Draw Concern
Nour Khalil, director of the Refugees Platform in Egypt, says the regulations cannot be viewed in isolation from the law itself, which he describes as “legislatively flawed” and in violation of the Egyptian constitution and the relevant international commitments and standards related to the protection of refugees and asylum seekers.
He adds, in remarks to Zawia3, that UN experts and the UNHCR had previously expressed reservations and warnings about the law, yet it was passed despite criticism concerning the criminalization of migrants, the absence of guarantees for the basic rights of asylum seekers, and the granting of broad powers to the Interior Ministry without adequate constraints. He considers the law to have been driven by a security philosophy more than a protective framework, as required by international standards.
Zawia3 contacted the UNHCR to inquire about its assessment of the executive regulations of the foreigners’ asylum law. The UNHCR replied only that it is currently reviewing the provisions of the regulations and will present its observations and comments at a later stage upon completion of the review process, without disclosing any preliminary assessment of their content or implications for the existing asylum system.
Nour Khalil explains that the executive regulations operate within the framework of a law he considers fundamentally flawed, one that diminishes international obligations and the levels of protection currently provided by the existing asylum system. He points to the secretive manner in which the law was drafted and passed as one of its shortcomings, with deliberations and drafting taking place away from public debate before the law was suddenly presented to the House of Representatives, noting that the same process was repeated with the executive regulations.
Nour Khalil notes that the regulations were issued later than the deadline set by the law, which should have, in his view, warranted greater caution and less haste, given that building a comprehensive national asylum system is an extremely complex process requiring time for the formulation of policies, legislation, and implementation mechanisms.
He also points out that the current regulations are only part of a broader legislative and regulatory framework, with other related regulations still pending, and notes that some of the timeframes contained therein appear unrealistic and are a cause for concern.
The director of the Refugees Platform affirms that executive regulations, by virtue of the hierarchy of legal norms, cannot address the substantive flaws contained in the original law, as their legislative force is subordinate to that of the law itself. Consequently, the provisions he considers flawed in the primary legislation cannot be remedied through the regulations.
He criticizes the process by which the regulations were drafted and issued, explaining that the relevant parties and stakeholders were not made aware of them until after their issuance, despite the official date of their publication being 21 May. He adds that the regulations had been circulating within security agencies prior to their publication but were not opened for discussion with specialized bodies, including experts at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, other relevant ministries, or the UNHCR. He considers the drafting process to have been conducted within a closed security framework lacking participation and consultation.
Nour Khalil considers the absence of participation to represent a fundamental flaw in the assessment of any legislation, including executive legislation, as evaluation is not limited to content alone but also encompasses how it is prepared and coordinated. He adds that the regulations did not provide clear answers on many details of the anticipated asylum system and referred a large number of matters to subsequent decisions, particularly those related to the technical secretariat tasked with managing the file.
He explains that the technical secretariat represents, in practice, the primary executive body of the new asylum system, and that rushing its establishment and operation carries significant risks, given the need to train its staff and establish working systems, protection mechanisms, and organized procedures, a process that may take years in other contexts. He considers there to be political pressure behind the hasty enactment of the law and regulations, at a time when the powers granted to competent authorities are being expanded without adequate safeguards or regard for the conditions of international protection.
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Rising Hate Speech Against Refugees
Nour Khalil draws attention to the context in which the regulations were drafted as a cause for concern, noting that information available to him indicates the draft regulations were completed in December and presented to the relevant authorities in January, coinciding with an escalation of hate speech against refugees and a widening of security campaigns targeting them.
He adds that this coincidence may reflect the existence of disagreements between some of the agencies involved regarding the management of the file and the drafting of the final regulations, which ultimately resulted in the Interior Ministry imposing its vision on the ground.
He continues that this context raises concerns that the new legislation does not stem from the needs of refugees or the requirements of protection, but rather from other considerations. He also notes that the law and regulations ignored the existence of an asylum system already in operation, managed by the UNHCR, explaining that the UNHCR is still the body responsible for registering refugees and asylum seekers, given that the formation of the national refugee committee has not yet been completed.
Nour Khalil dwells on the matter of transferring refugee files from the UNHCR to the new system, affirming that the discussion concerns more than one million files that cannot be transferred within the short timeframes contained in the regulations. He notes that the experiences of other countries such as Turkey, South Africa, and Uganda have shown that rapid and non-gradual transfers can lead to major crises.
He explains that the transfer of files also raises data protection and privacy concerns, as these files contain personal and sensitive information provided by refugees during refugee status determination interviews. He adds that some cases involve highly sensitive grounds for asylum, including gender identity or risks of personal persecution, making the sharing of this data with other bodies a matter requiring the consent of those concerned and clear guarantees for its protection.
He notes that the regulations did not answer fundamental questions regarding how transferred files will be handled, whether they will be re-examined, how to deal with asylum seekers whose applications have not yet been decided, or persons who had appointments with the UNHCR and had not yet undergone status determination interviews.
Regarding the motivations behind accelerating the implementation of the new system, Nour Khalil considers the European Union to be one of the most prominent driving parties. He explains that new European policies related to the concept of “safe third countries” are pushing for the establishment of national asylum systems in transit and host countries, allowing for the return of some migrants to them even if they are not their nationals.
He adds that European countries such as Italy and Greece are already studying the possibility of returning non-Egyptian migrants who passed through Egypt during their journeys, taking advantage of recent European legal amendments, and considers this orientation to be linked to European aid and funding provided to Cairo.
In March, UN experts expressed deep concern over the escalation of deportations, arbitrary arrests, and ongoing violations of the rights of refugees, asylum seekers, and migrants in Egypt, particularly women and children. They affirmed in a statement that the implementation of the new asylum law No. 164 of 2024 since December 2024 had led to an expansion of deportation operations during 2025 and the targeting of large numbers of Sudanese and Syrian nationals, including families, without individual assessment of the risks of “forced return.”
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How Will the New Regulations Affect the Situation of Refugees?
Nour Khalil warns that implementing the regulations in their current form may lead to an institutional vacuum and widespread administrative and legal problems, particularly given the lack of clarity regarding the status of refugees currently registered with the UNHCR or those who will submit asylum applications in the future.
He explains that the regulations did not address in detail the situation of the various categories of refugees, and limited itself to general references concerning the issuance of cards and administrative procedures, without resolving fundamental matters such as privacy policies, data transfers, mechanisms for re-examining files, and the situation of persons who entered the country through irregular means or whose applications are still under review.
He adds that establishing a comprehensive asylum system is comparable, in terms of complexity, to establishing a civil registry specifically for refugees, requiring the rules, procedures, and legal implications that extend to other areas such as personal status, nationality, and other related legislation.
He calls on the UNHCR to clarify its position in greater detail and announce its plan for the transition of responsibilities to the new system. He also called on the European Union to clarify the nature of the role played by the European Asylum Agency and various European bodies during the stages of drafting the regulations.
He affirms that the transition to the new system must take place gradually and over a sufficient period of time to ensure continuity of services and avoid harm to refugees and asylum seekers, stressing the necessity of maintaining the current registration system for an appropriate period to allow for a smooth transfer of responsibilities.
Nour Khalil stresses that the law, in his view, is open to challenge on grounds of unconstitutionality, and that the executive regulations may also be subject to challenge before the State Council during their implementation. He adds that the state is exposing itself to domestic legal risks as a result of this course of action, considering that the secrecy surrounding the drafting of the regulations, the haste in their issuance, the absence of substantive details within them, and their construction upon a law he considers flawed are all factors that may lead to serious consequences for refugees and asylum seekers, as well as for the Egyptian justice system itself.
He notes that these observations represent a preliminary reading of the executive regulations, explaining that the relevant parties were not given the opportunity to review or discuss them prior to their sudden publication.
Egypt’s Refugee Map
The latest data from the UNHCR indicates that Egypt hosts more than 1.1 million registered refugees and asylum seekers as of spring 2026, from more than 60 different nationalities, amid continued regional displacement flows resulting from armed conflicts and humanitarian crises in a number of neighboring countries.
Sudanese nationals make up the largest proportion of registered refugees and asylum seekers in Egypt, following the war that has been raging in Sudan since April 2023 and which triggered a massive wave of displacement toward Egyptian territory. The main nationalities registered with the UNHCR also include Syrians, South Sudanese, Eritreans, Ethiopians, Yemenis, Somalis, and Iraqis.
A clear gap exists between the figures recognized by the UNHCR and official Egyptian figures. While the UNHCR places the number of registered refugees and asylum seekers at approximately 1.1 million, the Egyptian government asserts that it hosts around 10 million foreigners, migrants, refugees, and displaced persons of various nationalities. This discrepancy is attributable to differences in the methodology used for counting: the government figure includes all foreign residents, arrivals, and displaced persons on Egyptian soil, while the UNHCR figure is limited to those registered with it as refugees or asylum seekers.
Cairo draws on these figures to emphasize the economic and service burdens arising from hosting large numbers of arrivals, particularly in the sectors of education, health, housing, and infrastructure, calling on the international community to increase support for refugee-hosting countries, at a time when the region is witnessing one of the largest waves of forced displacement in the world.
The United Nations defines a refugee as a person forced to leave their country due to circumstances such as war, violence, or persecution, and who is unable or unwilling to return. The 1951 UN Refugee Convention defines a refugee as “a person who is outside their country of origin or habitual residence as a result of a well-founded fear of persecution on account of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group, or political opinion, and who is unable or unwilling to avail themselves of the protection of that country or to return to it because of that fear.”
In December 2024, the asylum law passed by the Egyptian government sparked widespread controversy domestically and internationally, due to provisions imposing arbitrary restrictions on the right to asylum.
The law comprised 39 articles regulating the situation of refugees in the country. Among the most notable was the establishment of a permanent committee for refugee affairs reporting to the Council of Ministers, tasked with collecting data and statistics on refugee numbers and with ruling on asylum applications. It set a six-month period for decisions on applications submitted by those who entered through regular channels, rising to one year for those who entered irregularly, and grants priority consideration to the most vulnerable groups, including persons with disabilities, the elderly, pregnant women, unaccompanied children, and victims of human trafficking and sexual violence.
The law established a set of rights for refugees, including a prohibition on the extradition of a refugee to the country of their nationality, the right to litigation with exemption from court fees, the right to basic education and appropriate healthcare, and the right to work either independently or by establishing or joining companies, without the imposition of additional taxes or financial burdens. The law additionally grants refugees the right to apply for Egyptian nationality in accordance with prescribed procedures.
The law prohibits refugees from engaging in any activities that may affect national security or public order, and bars them from political or partisan activity or any activity within trade unions, in order to ensure their compliance with local laws and customs. The law also grants the committee responsible for refugee affairs the authority to resettle refugees in other countries in coordination with the relevant international bodies, and sets conditions for the termination of refugee status, such as the voluntary return of the refugee to their homeland, the acquisition of another nationality, or departure from the country for a period of six consecutive months without an excuse accepted by the competent committee.
The law requires refugees to respect the Egyptian constitution, laws, and societal values, and prohibits any activities that may affect national security or public order. It also prohibits any actions that conflict with the goals and principles of the United Nations, the African Union, or the Arab League. The law allows for the stripping of refugee status and the immediate expulsion of a person from the country if it is established that they obtained such status through fraud, deception, or the concealment of essential information, and the status is likewise revoked if the refugee commits any of the prohibited acts stipulated in the law.
With the issuance of the executive regulations, the government has effectively taken the first steps toward transferring the management of the asylum file from the UNHCR to Egyptian state institutions. However, this transition, which affects more than one million refugees and asylum seekers, remains surrounded by questions regarding implementation mechanisms, protection guarantees, and the fate of existing files.
