European legislation governing the procedure for foreign citizens to request international protection. The version of the regulation that has been in force since 2014 is called Dublin III; it establishes the criteria and mechanisms for determining the member state responsible for examining an application for international protection. The basic principle is that the “competent country” is the applicant's first European country of arrival. If this state has the obligation to evaluate the request for international protection using a specific procedure, the asylum seeker cannot travel to other European countries or submit another asylum application in another European country. Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway, and Switzerland have also joined onto the provisions of this legislation even though they are not members of the European Union.
