(CN) — Italy will build two centers in Albania where it can send people seeking asylum in the European Union and process their applications, a move that Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni hailed on Tuesday as a model for the rest of the bloc.
On Monday, Meloni, the leader of Italy's far-right Brothers of Italy, and Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama announced a deal allowing Italy to construct two centers in Albania where up to 36,000 asylum-seekers a year could be housed and processed. The centers will be run by Italian authorities and fall under Italian laws.
The deal is highly controversial, but other European leaders are looking at similar ideas to stem the flow of people seeking entry to Europe. At the same time, EU leaders are increasingly talking about the need to step up deportations of people living in the EU without authorization.
In Europe, backlash against the arrival of large numbers of migrants from Asia and Africa is growing and fueling the rise of far-right political parties. In response, governments are taking tougher steps to stop migrants, including the resumption of border checks in recent weeks between EU countries, a move that undermines the bloc's core principle of free movement.
The deal between Italy and Albania, a Balkan nation seeking entry into the EU, was the first of its kind, though the EU previously has entered agreements with Turkey, Morocco and Libya to stop migrants from entering the bloc.
“This could become a model of cooperation between EU countries and countries outside the EU in dealing with migratory flows,” Meloni said in an interview with Il Messaggero, an Italian newspaper.
Italy's plan resembles a controversial deal the United Kingdom struck in April 2022 to send asylum seekers to Rwanda, in East Africa. That plan was halted only hours before the first deportations were set to take place in June 2022 after an intervention by the European Court of Human Rights.
At the time, the United Nations condemned the U.K.-Rwanda immigration partnership for “externalizing” Britain's “fundamental obligations to people seeking asylum” and warned such an asylum model would undermine the international refugee protection system.
On Tuesday, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, a Social Democrat, said he too wanted to examine setting up a system for processing asylum claims outside the EU, though he appeared skeptical about whether it would pass legal scrutiny.
Besides agreeing to study processing claims abroad, Scholz's center-left government said it will take a harder line on migrants after meeting with German state leaders. Scholz promised to provide extra cash for local authorities and to cut benefits for asylum-seekers.
The tough-on-migrants stance is being voiced across the bloc. Austria has expressed interest in processing claims for asylum abroad and the National Assembly in France was in heated debate Tuesday over a tough immigration law that would speed up deportations of foreigners who commit crimes.
Under the deal with Albania, Italy agreed to build the centers in northwestern Albania with its own money and said they should be open by next spring. It was unclear whether Italy would provide Albania with financial payments too, though Meloni promised to help Tirana in its bid to join the EU.
The Italian scheme envisions that any migrants picked up at sea who are attempting to reach Italy's shores would be sent to Albania. Every year, thousands of people cross the Mediterranean Sea in a dangerous journey to reach Sicily and other southern regions.
Italy says pregnant women, minors and vulnerable people will not be sent to Albania and instead will have their claims processed in Italy. Also, asylum-seekers who make it to Italian shores and those picked up by humanitarian vessels will not be sent to Albania, according to Italian officials.
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