In a move that quickly raised outrage (and equal interest) across the continent, the Italian government formalized a highly controversial agreement with Albania for the establishment of Italian detention centers outside the bloc for asylum seekers: Italy funded and opened two camps in Shengjin and Gjader, in order to decide there the fates of thousands of vulnerable people arrived in Italy but sent away to be detained on Albanian soil. The price tag attached? Approximately €100 million annually and perhaps the core values of human rights in Europe.
This is not just another outsourced border solution: this is a full-scale externalization of EU asylum responsibilities, dressed up in rhetoric promising “deterrence” and greater controls. It stands as a direct attack against the fabric of European asylum law, undermining basic rights for those who seek refuge from dire circumstances.
Under the terms of the Italy-Albania Protocol, a few thousands migrants a year, rescued or intercepted at sea by Italian vessels, will be taken not to Italian ports, but to Albania: they will be detained there while Italian authorities will review their applications for asylum, a procedure technically falling within the authority of Italy, yet being carried out on foreign territory. This plan allows that only male applicants from “safe” countries under Italian definition will be subjected to this offshore processing; a tenuous concession leaving wider ramifications markedly open-ended.
While Italian officials have touted the process will deliver a speedier asylum decision (to as little as 28 days), Amnesty International, the UN, and several human rights groups question whether that expediency can possibly be had with robust judicial review. Or worse yet, if efficiency is merely the cover for detaining, rejecting, and rapidly deporting thousands without examination.
What’s more alarming is the precedent this will create for the EU, since it is largely modeled, some would say, off Australia’s extraterritorial processing on Nauru and Manus Island where detainees languished under inhumane conditions. Europe is now experimenting with its version of offshoring, taking advantage of the economically weak position of Albania, a strategy smelling heavily of opportunism and almost of neocolonialism.
As said by Amnesty International: “the transfer of responsibilities to Albania, which has fewer resources and infrastructure, is a moral hazard.”
Italy has continued to play with fire, testing the limits of European asylum policy through cooperation with Libya and Tunisia that already resulted in tragic consequences for those trapped in violent and exploitative situations. Moving the processing center just beyond the EU’s borders, Italy is taking up a role of a rule-maker rather than a rule-follower, disregarding international obligations that put at least a minimum on humane treatment and proper legal process when it comes to asylum seekers: these centers appear as a quick fix, a panacea for “disrupting the migration route” to Europe, no matter the human consequences.
The EU’s reaction has been lukewarm, if not overtly ambiguous. Where the legal services of the European Commission at first considered the Italy-Albania protocol to be working “outside” EU law (which is an odd position anyway, since Albania is set to be joining the EU within the next five years, and that would definitely make the agreement contrary to EU laws), such a stance clashes with the express mention of Italian and European rules in the text of the agreement, and these unclear edges of jurisdiction create the impression that the EU is giving a seal of approval to a new model of containment outside its borders.
The Commissioner for Human Rights at the Council of Europe also warned that outsourcing the EU’s asylum responsibilities "sets a dangerous precedent”: if the European Union cannot (or will not) enforce its own human rights standards, then it raises a question about Europe’s credibility in safeguarding international norms. And indeed, if Italy is allowed to circumvent the EU’s asylum responsibilities, why shouldn’t other member states follow suit?
Just consider the human cost: think of asylum seekers intercepted at sea, already traumatized, confined to overcrowded facilities for as long as 18 months without adequate legal recourse or the option to leave; according to Amnesty International, these facilities are akin to "zones of exclusion”, devoid of real oversight or accountability.
The European Court of Human Rights has already ruled against similar offshore detention models, yet the Italian government is gambling on EU apathy to keep this scheme afloat, and so far it worked.
But Von der Leyen giving Meloni a pass is most certainly not news.
The protocol puts the lives of asylum seekers into the hands of officials far removed from the shores of Italy, as well as from its accountability mechanisms. In this light, the whole arrangement is no different from what Italy did in 2008 with regard to pushbacks to Libya, which resulted in violations of the international principle of non-refoulement. That Italy is willing to revive such tactics on the Albanian border reflects not only a disregard for fundamental rights, but also an acute indifference to the lessons of past failures.
For 112 million euros a year, Italy has bought itself a temporary migration solution, one that could snowball into the EU’s next existential crisis: if asylum processing can now be done off the record, what’s next? Greece processing asylum claims in the Middle East? France in North Africa?
In fact, Meloni’s administration is already playing with the idea of extending this failing “Albanian model” to other EU countries, and the message coming from the EU, with its overall silence on this protocol, is a deeply disturbing one, one which emboldens those who seek to dismantle asylum law and externalize Europe’s humanitarian obligations.
The issue is that the European Union has already signaled a possible lurch toward more restrictive migration policies, proposing the concept of offshore “return hubs” to facilitate deportations: the plan emerged during talks at a recent summit as leaders sought to tackle rising migration pressures amid gains made by a resurgent far-right in the June EU elections. The European Commission President said leaders were considering return hubs beyond the EU, where those deemed ineligible to stay would be processed.
However, to date, its implementation has done little to relieve pressure on Italy’s Lampedusa reception center. For example, one recent costly operation relocated just 16 individuals from Italy to Albania; and several of these were returned after a few days because of their age and frailty. The financial cost and the very little success of the model so far should mean that it is unlikely to be long-term viable; but political leaders are not always rational, especially when it comes to migration issues, and they might be tempted to try it nonetheless. Also, more recently, some Italian judges from Bologna have referred this new Italian migration policy to the European Court of Justice and contested the new labeling of some countries as “safe” for repatriation, in view of documented proof of persecution of minorities in those areas: having considered a country as a whole to be “safe” without addressing minority risks is against EU and international protection standards, and further complicates the migration policies in Italy; given the referral, the process could now take years, leaving the future of this shameless migration model in a legal and judicial limbo.
All this considered, it is no surprise that most of top EU leaders themselves are divided: Greek Prime Minister Mitsotakis called for more legal migration pathways, underlining that irregular arrivals cannot cover necessary labor shortages; Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez resisted this offshore model, calling for a sharing of responsibilities with countries of origin in a balanced, secure migration policy. Other leaders, like Denmark’s Mette Frederiksen and the Dutch Prime Minister Dick Schoof, are pressing for alternatives other than the status quo and stricter mechanisms of enforcement against those breaking laws in host countries.
In conclusion, this Italy-Albania migration agreement is already a dangerous precedent: a temporary political bandage on the migration wounds of the EU, one that is going to undermine the very moral fiber of Europe. At the same time as leaders like Meloni cheer on such offshoring tactics as the solution to everything, they are dangerously distorting the core values of Europe, reinventing the EU not as a beacon of human rights but as a fortress against the desperate and displaced. Legal safeguards on asylum in Europe should not be sacrificed at the altar of short-term appeasement to the demands of the far right or the fear of rising nationalist sentiment.
The question must be put to the leaders: is this the Europe we want to build, one ready to outsource responsibility and human rights and to circumvent the principles that unified and defined it? Or shall we find ways that respect the legal and moral commitments of Europe and forge a migration policy that is humane, granting real refuge and due process? The Italy-Albania model poses a threat not only to those it seeks to “process” but to the integrity of Europe itself.
Europe must renounce such myopic solutions and reclaim its position as a defender of human rights and humanitarian values, not their executioner.
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