1. Member States shall examine an application for international protection by a third-country national or a stateless person who applies on the territory of any one of them, including at the border or in the transit zones. The application shall be examined by a single Member State which shall be the Member State responsible on the basis of the criteria set out in Chapter II or the clauses set out in Chapter III of this Part.
2. Without prejudice to the rules set out in Part IV of this Regulation, where no Member State can be determined responsible for examining the application for international protection on the basis of the criteria listed in this Regulation, the first Member State in which the application for international protection was registered shall be responsible for examining it.
3. Where it is impossible for a Member State to transfer an applicant to the Member State primarily designated as responsible because there are substantial grounds for believing that the applicant, because of the transfer to that Member State, would face a real risk of violation of the applicant’s fundamental rights that amounts to inhuman or degrading treatment within the meaning of Article 4 of , the determining Member State shall continue to examine the criteria set out in Chapter II or the clauses set out in Chapter III of this Part in order to establish whether another Member State can be designated as responsible.
Where a Member State cannot carry out the transfer pursuant to the first subparagraph of this paragraph to any Member State designated on the basis of the criteria set out in Chapter II or the clauses set out in Chapter III of this Part or to the first Member State with which the application was registered, and cannot establish whether another Member State can be designated as responsible, that Member State shall become the Member State responsible for examining the application for international protection.
4. If a security check provided for in Article 15 of has not been carried out pursuant to that Regulation, the first Member State in which the application for international protection was registered shall examine whether there are reasonable grounds to consider that the applicant poses a threat to internal security as soon as possible after the registration of the application, before applying the criteria for determining the Member State responsible pursuant to Chapter II or the clauses set out in Chapter III of this Part.
If a security check provided for in Article 15 of has been carried out, but the first Member State in which the application for international protection was registered has justified reasons to examine whether there are reasonable grounds to consider that the applicant poses a threat to internal security, that Member State shall carry out the examination as soon as possible after the registration of the application, before applying the criteria for determining the Member State responsible pursuant to Chapter II or the clauses set out in Chapter III of this Part.
Where the security check carried out in accordance with Article 15 of or in accordance with the first and second subparagraphs of this paragraph shows that there are reasonable grounds to consider that the applicant poses a threat to internal security, the Member State carrying out the security check shall be the Member State responsible, and Article 39 of this Regulation shall not apply.
5. Each Member State shall retain the right to send an applicant to a safe third country, subject to the rules and safeguards laid down in .
Correlation table
| Regulation (EU) No 604/2013 | This Regulation |
| Article 3 | Article 16 |