UN refugee agency helps EU countries design deported migrant ‘return hubs’ outside Europe
by https://euobserver.com/author/nikolaj-nielsen/ · EUobserverThe UNHCR warned that failed asylum seekers have committed no crime: ‘They failed to demonstrate a well-founded fear of perception. It’s not a crime, it cannot be punished, and certainly not in a third country’
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By Nikolaj Nielsen,
Brussels
,
The UN refugee agency (UNHCR) has been actively advising EU states hoping to set up so-called ‘return hubs’ outside the bloc, where rejected asylum seekers can be kept before eventually departing to their final destinations.
“We have not only been approached by those member states, but we have also been proactively advising them,” Jean-Nicolas Beuze, who heads the Brussels office the UN agency, told EUobserver on Friday (5 June).
Return hubs have grabbed headlines for months and were given extra impetus following the political agreement reached earlier this week on the EU’s deportation bill.
Austria, Denmark, Germany, Greece, and the Netherlands are now among those taking an early lead in their creation. Both Germany and the Netherlands want such hubs set up before the year’s end.
Where they will be created remains uncertain, but Kenya, Senegal, Uganda, and Uzbekistan are among those previously reported as possible host countries.
UNHCR says such hubs cannot be detention centres because people arriving in Europe to apply for asylum and then failing to convince authorities of the merits is not a crime.
“They failed to demonstrate a well-founded fear of perception. It’s not a crime, it cannot be punished, and certainly not in a third country,” he said.
Instead, such any centres or facilities must be open and provide people access to education, job opportunities and the freedom to move around in the territory.
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The UNHCR warned that failed asylum seekers have committed no crime: ‘They failed to demonstrate a well-founded fear of perception. It’s not a crime, it cannot be punished, and certainly not in a third country’
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Author Bio
Nikolaj Nielsen joined EUobserver in 2012 and covers home affairs. He is originally from Denmark, but spent much of his life in France and in Belgium. He was awarded the King Baudouin Foundation grant for investigative journalism in 2010.
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