EU Backs Return Hubs With No Hosts

The EU now has a legal route to set up deportation centres beyond its own borders. What it does not have is a country willing to host them.

That is the practical problem at the heart of the new Return Regulation, approved by the European Parliament on 17 June. For the first time, member states would have a legal basis to run removal facilities outside EU territory (European Parliament, DW).

Nineteen EU leaders have urged the European Commission to move quickly, including with EU money (Statsministeriet). Austria, Denmark, Greece and the Netherlands are reportedly looking at possible locations. The EU Council, where national governments co-legislate, still has to give formal approval.

But the decisive actor is not in Brussels. It is the third country that would accept detainees on its own soil. So far, nobody has said yes.

Why Most Deportation Orders Go Nowhere

The case for tougher returns starts from a real failure in the current system. Only around 28% of EU return decisions end with the person actually leaving, according to the regulation's parliamentary rapporteur Malik Azmani (EP interview).

The new rules would create a European Return Order, valid across member states, and allow people to be transferred to detention outside the EU. That gives governments a new instrument. It does not solve the older blockage.

Most failed deportations are not caused by a shortage of detention space. Countries of origin refuse to issue travel documents. Consulates delay. Courts intervene. A College of Europe analysis put the central problem plainly: returns depend on cooperation from origin countries willing to accept people back (College of Europe).

Parliament can authorise a new tool. It cannot compel a third country to host a centre, or force a country of origin to readmit its nationals.

Italy Tried. Five People Were Returned.

Italy is the only EU government to have tested anything close to this model. It runs two facilities in Albania, one for identification at Shëngjin and one for detention at Gjadër, both operating under Italian law.

After courts rejected the first detentions in late 2024, Rome shifted the project away from offshore asylum processing and towards holding people already ordered to leave (EFE).

The results have been slight. Internazionale, citing documents obtained by Altreconomia, reported five migrants returned directly from Albania to Egypt. Others sent to Albania ended up back in Italy. The same investigation counted 54 incidents requiring emergency response in Gjadër's opening days (Internazionale).

The courts have still to settle the bigger question. According to an ECRE/ELENA update, the Albanian model is under review at the EU's Court of Justice in joined cases C-706/25 and C-707/25, testing whether the facilities comply with EU asylum law (ECRE/ELENA).

Giorgia Meloni says the Parliament vote validates her approach (La Nación). The courts have not yet agreed.

The Funding Fight and the Rights Question

Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis has put the clearest timetable on the idea: agreements by the end of 2026, with centres operating from 2027 (Le Monde).

Germany joined a working group on possible hub locations but did not sign the letter backed by 19 leaders (EUobserver).

France and Spain cannot block the regulation under qualified majority voting, the EU system where a supermajority of countries and population is needed rather than a single-state veto. They can still make the project harder to finance and defend.

Emmanuel Macron said France would oppose using the EU budget to pay for the centres. Pedro Sánchez called them ineffective and damaging to relations with the transit countries Europe relies on (Euronews, El País).

The regulation also removes a safeguard. Appeals against deportation would no longer automatically suspend removal, with judges deciding that question case by case (European Parliament, Politis).

The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights warned that governments cannot outsource responsibility when someone is unlawfully detained or denied an effective appeal (European Times). Amnesty raised the risk of holding people in countries where they have no ties and no access to lawyers (Amnesty).

Parliament has approved the framework. The Council still has to sign off. A host country still has to agree. Courts in Luxembourg and Strasbourg still have to decide whether EU rights protections follow people beyond EU borders.

The political momentum is real. The working model is still missing.