20.12.2011 Official Journal of the European Union L 337/9 DIRECTIVES DIRECTIVE 2011/95/EU OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND OF THE COUNCIL of 13 December 2011 on standards for the qualification of third-country nationals or stateless persons as beneficiaries of international protection, for a uniform status for refugees or for persons eligible for subsidiary protection, and for the content of the protection granted (recast) THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND THE COUNCIL OF THE EUROPEAN UNION, Having regard to the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, and in particular points (a) and (b) of Article 78(2) thereof, Having regard to the proposal from the European Commission, Having regard to the opinion of the European Economic and Social Committee (1), Acting in accordance with the ordinary legislative procedure (3), Whereas: (1) A number of substantive changes are to be made to Council Directive 2004/83/EC of 29 April 2004 on minimum standards for the qualification and status of third country nationals or stateless persons as refugees or as persons who otherwise need international protection and the content of the protection granted (3). In the interests of clarity, that Directive should be recast. (20 A common policy on asylum, including a Common European Asylum System, is a constituent part of the European Union’s objective of progressively establishing an area of freedom, security and justice open to those who, forced by circumstances, legitimately seek protection in the Union. (3)  The European Council at its special meeting in Tampere on 15 and 16 October 1999 agreed to work towards establishing a Common European Asylum System, based on the full and inclusive application of the Geneva Convention of 28 July 1951 relating to the Status of () OJ C 18, 19.1.2011, p. 80. (3) Position of the European Parliament of 27 October 2011 (not yet published in the Official Journal) and decision of the Council of 24 November 2011. () OJ L 304, 30.9.2004, p. 12. Refugees (the Geneva Convention’), as supplemented by the New York Protocol of 31 January 1967 (the Protocol’), thus affirming the principle of non-refoulement and ensuring that nobody is sent back to persecution. The Geneva Convention and the Protocol provide the cornerstone of the international legal regime for the protection of refugees. The Tampere conclusions provide that a Common European Asylum System should include, in the short term, the approximation of rules on the recognition of refugees and the content of refugee status. The Tampere conclusions also provide that rules regarding refugee status should be complemented by measures on subsidiary forms of protection, offering an appropriate status to any person in need of such protection. The first phase in the creation of a Common European Asylum System has now been achieved. The European Council of 4 November 2004 adopted the Hague Programme, which sets the objectives to be implemented in the area of freedom, security and justice in the period 2005-2010. In this respect, the Hague Programme invited the European Commission to conclude the evaluation of the first-phase legal instruments and to submit the second-phase instruments and measures to the European Parliament and the Council, with a view to their adoption before the end of 2010. In the European Pact on Immigration and Asylum, adopted on 15 and 16 October 2008, the European Council noted that considerable disparities remain between one Member State and another concerning the grant of protection and the forms that protection takes and called for new initiatives to complete the estab- lishment of a Common European Asylum System, provided for in the Hague Programme, and thus to offer a higher degree of protection.