La qualità di rifugiato al vaglio della Corte di giustizia dell'Unione europea: i diritti dei beneficiari di protezione internazionale tra "Ginevra" e "Lisbona"

This contribution illustrates the major implications flowing from the judgement of the CJEU in M, X and X (Joined Cases C-39116, C-77/17 and C-78/17) where the Grand Chamber has made it clear that the effect of the revocation of or the refusal to grant refugee status is neither that a person who has a well-founded fear of persecution in his or her country of origin is not a refugee, nor that he or she does not benefit from the rights attached to the refugee status under the 1951 Geneva Convention. In particular, this contribution, after having mentioned the status of the Geneva Convention within the EU legal system, analyses the reasoning of the Luxembourg judges relating to the reconstruction of the rights that shall be recognized to individuals who are ‘refugees’ for the purpose of Article 2(d) of Directive 2011/95 and Article 1(A) of the Geneva Convention. Two perspectives are stressed in this respect. On the one hand, the contribution highlights the mutual interaction between the Geneva and EU rules, leading to a strengthening of the two sets of rules; on the other hand, particular emphasis is placed on the contribution given by the CJEU in clarifying the interplay between the cessation and exclusion clauses enshrined in the EU Qualification Directive and the principle of non-refoulement. In the concluding remarks, some comments on the implications concerning the Italian legal order follow.