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Italy sent its first boat transporting migrants to Albania on Monday, part of the country’s five-year agreement to process asylum seekers in detention centers in the state that is outside the European Union, and an agreement that has sparked outrage from human rights groups, France24 reported.
Sixteen migrants from Egypt and Bangladesh had been rescued in international waters by the Italian Coast Guard after departing Libya for Italy, reported ABC News.
Instead of their asylum claims being processed in Italy, though, an Italian ship named the Libra with the migrants on board left the Italian island of Lampedusa in the Mediterranean and headed for the Albanian port of Shengjin.
Last November, Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni and Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama signed the deal which specified up to 3,000 migrants picked up by the Italian Coast Guard would be sent to Albania each month. The Libra was the first of these voyages.
Rama said despite high demand from multiple countries in Europe, only Italy is allowed to operate detention centers in Albania. An exception was made for Italy due to the country’s close ties with the country across the Adriatic Sea, ABC News wrote.
The migrants will be initially screened on board the Italian ships and their cases will be more closely examined at the detention center in Shengjin. Those migrants who are accepted will return to Italy. Those rejected will be deported from Albania.
Meanwhile, the Italian government has said that “vulnerable” migrants, such as children, pregnant women, and the ill and the disabled, would be processed in Italy. Only “non-vulnerable” men coming from “safe countries” would be sent to the centers in Albania.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has endorsed the agreement, citing it as an example of “out-of-box thinking,” according to the New York Times.
While being applauded by the Italian government and some European leaders hoping to deter migration to the EU, the plan has also been criticized by human rights groups who fear that such a plan puts migrants at risk and exposes them to human rights violations.
Susanna Zanfrini of the International Rescue Committee’s office in Italy criticized the detention centers for being “costly, cruel and counterproductive,” ABC reported.
This is not the first time the EU has tried to “externalize” its migration processing to non-EU states: It made a deal with Turkey in 2016 to slow migration into the bloc and accept deported asylum seekers back into that country in exchange for about 9 billion euros ($10 billion).
Meanwhile, the United Kingdom tried to implement a similar deal with Rwanda, but it was halted by British courts.
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