This glossary is mainly aimed at establishing a common understanding of the most relevant terms used in the referral process.
The glossary structure is as follows.
- The term in alphabetical order with the synonym, if applicable.
- The definition: some definitions have been partially adapted from the original source in order to be more specific and better reflect the practical context of referral.
- Sources of the definitions:
- legal definitions given by the EU legal instruments (EU asylum and migration acquis) but also international instruments including conventions, protocols, etc.
- glossaries, guidance, reports, handbooks and other materials provided by other EU agencies and international organisations (such as IOM, OHCHR, UNHCR).
| Term | Definition | Source |
| Accompanied child | A child who arrives in a Member State accompanied by parent(s), or an adult who is considered responsible for the child according to the law or the practice of the Member State concerned, and remains accompanied after entering the territory of the Member State | IATE - European Union terminology |
| Accompanying adult | An adult who appears with a child before the authorities, but who is not the adult responsible for the child whether by law or by the practice of the Member State concerned. | IATE - European Union terminology |
| Age assessment | The process by which authorities seek to estimate the chronological age or range of age of an applicant in order to establish whether an applicant is a child or an adult. | IATE - European Union terminology |
| Applicant | Third-country national or a stateless person who has made an application for international protection in respect of which a final decision has not yet been taken | |
| Applicant in a vulnerable situation | An applicant whose ability to understand and effectively present their case or fully participate in the process and/or benefit from the reception conditions is limited due to their individual circumstances. | EUAA Vulnerability Strategy |
| Applicant in need of special procedural guarantees | An applicant whose ability to benefit from the rights and comply with the obligations provided for in this Regulation is limited due to individual circumstances, such as specific vulnerabilities. | Article 3(14) APR |
| Applicant with special reception needs | An applicant who is in need of special conditions or guarantees in order to benefit from the rights and comply with the obligations provided for in this Directive. | Article 2(14) RCD |
| Best interests assessment (BIA) | Refers to a process in which all relevant elements are identified, assessed, evaluated and balanced in order to support authorities in taking a decision in a specific case concerning an individual child or, where relevant, a group of children. It is carried out by the decision‑maker and his or her staff – also in a multidisciplinary team – and requires the participation of the child and the guardian
| UNCRC, General Comment No 14, 2013 |
| Consent | Any freely given, specific, informed and unambiguous indication of the data subject’s wishes by which he or she, by a statement or by a clear affirmative action, signifies agreement to the processing of personal data relating to him or her | Article 4(11) GDPR |
| Family tracing | Family tracing is the search for family members (including relatives or former caregivers of unaccompanied children) with the purpose of the restoration of family links and family reunification when they entail the best interests of the child. | UNCRC, General Comment No 6 |
| Family member | Family who family already existed before the applicant or the family member arrived on the territory of the Member States:
| Recital 9 - Right to family reunification
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Gender-based violence
| An umbrella term for any harmful act that is perpetrated against a person’s will and is based on socially ascribed (i.e. gender) differences between males and females. It includes acts that inflict physical, sexual or mental harm or suffering, threats of such acts, coercion, and denial of resources, opportunities of services, forced marriage and other deprivations of liberty. These acts can occur in public or in private.
| IASC Guidelines for Integrating GBV Interventions in Humanitarian Action |
| Guardian | A natural person or an organisation, including a public body, designated by the competent authorities to assist, represent and act on behalf of an unaccompanied minor, as applicable, in order to ensure that the unaccompanied minor can benefit from the rights and comply with the obligations under this Regulation, while safeguarding his or her best interests and general well-being. | Article 3(18) QR |
| Referral mechanism | In the context of migration, cooperative action aimed at identifying, protecting and assisting persons in need of international protection and persons in a vulnerable situation, by referring them to the relevant public authorities | IATE - European Union terminology |
| Relative | A relative is not an immediate family member but a person with whom an unaccompanied child may have a link and with whom the child can be reunited if that is in the child’s best interests. The applicant’s adult aunt or uncle or grandparent who is present in the territory of a Member State, regardless of whether the applicant was born in or out of wedlock or adopted as defined under national law. | Article 2(9) AMMR |
| Representative | A person or an organisation appointed by the competent bodies in order to assist and represent an unaccompanied minor in International Protection procedures provided with a view to ensuring the child’s best interests and exercising legal capacity for the minor where necessary. The term ‘guardian’ is used in the context of the QR . According to the respective definitions, they will have the same role but different tasks. However, for the sake of ensuring the continuity of the representation of the unaccompanied minor, the guardian in the context of the QR can be the same person as the representative appointed in the context of the RCD (2024) and the APR. | Article 13 Screening, Article 23 APR, Article 2(13) RCD ; Article 2 AMMR |
| Revictimisation/ secondary victimisation | Secondary victimisation occurs when the victim suffers further harm not as a direct result of the criminal act but due to the manner in which institutions and other individuals deal with the victim. Secondary victimisation may be caused, for instance, by repeated exposure of the victim to the perpetrator, repeated interrogation about the same facts, the use of inappropriate language or insensitive comments made by all those who encounter victims. | Council of Europe (2006), Recommendation Rec(2006)8 of the Committee of Ministers to member states on assistance to crime victims |
| Separated children | Children who have been separated from both parents, or from their previous legal or customary primary caregiver, but not necessarily from other relatives. These may, therefore, include children accompanied by other adult family members | UNCRC General Comment N6, 2005 UNHCR, Safe and Sound |
| Sexual orientation, gender identity and expression and sex characteristics (SOGIESC) | Sexual orientation refers to each person’s capacity for profound emotional, affectional and sexual attraction to, and intimate and sexual relations with, individuals of a different gender or the same gender or more than one gender.
Gender identity is understood to refer to each person’s deeply felt internal and individual experience of gender, which may or may not correspond with the sex assigned at birth, including the personal sense of the body and other expressions of gender, including dress, speech and mannerisms
Gender expression refers to people's manifestation of their gender identity, and the one that is perceived by others. Typically, people seek to make their gender expression or presentation match their gender identity/identities, irrespective of the sex that they were assigned at birth. Sex a person’s biological status which is determined by several indicators (or ‘sex characteristics’), including sex chromosomes, gonads producing hormones, internal reproductive organs and external genitalia. Sex is typically categorised as male, female or intersex.
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| Special procedural guarantees | Specific support measures put in place in order to create the conditions that are necessary for persons with special needs to have effective access to procedures and present the elements needed to substantiate their application for international protection. | IATE - European Union terminology |
| Trafficking in human beings (THB) | The recruitment, transportation, transfer, harbouring or reception of persons, including the exchange or transfer of control over those persons, by means of the threat or use of force or other forms of coercion, of abduction, of fraud, of deception, of the abuse of power or of a position of vulnerability or of the giving or receiving of payments or benefits to achieve the consent of a person having control over another person, for the purpose of exploitation. […] 3. Exploitation shall include, as a minimum, the exploitation of the prostitution of others or other forms of sexual exploitation, forced labour or services, including begging, slavery or practices similar to slavery, servitude, or the exploitation of criminal activities, or the removal of organs. | Article 2 Directive 2011/36/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council of 5 April 2011 on preventing and combating trafficking in human beings and protecting its victims |
| Unaccompanied child/minor | A child/minor who arrives on the territory of the Member States unaccompanied by an adult responsible for him or her, whether by the law or practice of the Member State concerned, and for as long as that minor is not effectively taken into the care of such an adult, including a minor who is left unaccompanied after he or she has entered the territory of the Member States |