Five European countries say they intend to sign agreements this year to send migrants without legal residency to countries outside the European Union, following a meeting hosted by Denmark on Friday.
Germany, Austria, Greece, Denmark and the Netherlands — a bloc calling itself the Group of Five — said they had agreed on concrete steps toward a deal with a non-EU country on return facilities, Ada Derana reported carrying Reuters copy. Hiru News carried the same report.
The group did not name the countries it expects to host the return centres.
“We want to reach an agreement with third countries this year that will enable the establishment of return hubs,” German Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt told reporters at a press conference in Copenhagen.
Danish Immigration and Integration Minister Morten Bodskov said Denmark expects to be ready to send migrants to a return hub by the end of 2027. “It’s a new chance to have a life in a partner country,” he said, adding that the five nations would talk to the International Organization for Migration and the UN Refugee Agency about next steps.
A UNHCR spokesperson said the agency had not been approached with details of a proposal and could not comment on the arrangements being discussed.
The legal groundwork
The European Parliament approved an overhaul of migration policy in June aimed at speeding up deportations and allowing member states to set up centres abroad — a change critics say could weaken safeguards for asylum seekers.
The Council of Europe, a non-EU body that promotes human rights, democracy and the rule of law across the continent, said in July that return hubs posed “considerable human rights risks”. Several other organisations have criticised the plan.
Danish Refugee Council Secretary General Charlotte Slente argued that implementing the existing EU Pact on Migration and Asylum — which focuses on stricter border screening, faster asylum and return procedures, and expanded digital case management — would be the better course.
“Return hubs focus on a small number of returns, they will not stop people from taking even more dangerous routes, and they could violate basic human rights,” Slente said.
The group, which has met several times this year, plans to reconvene in Munich at the end of September.
Not reported
Neither outlet identifies the third countries under discussion, the number of people the hubs would be expected to hold, the cost, or how transfers would work in law. Both carry identical wire copy, so there is no independent account of Friday’s meeting. There is no indication of whether any South Asian country is among those approached, and no comment from the European Commission on whether the Group of Five’s plan aligns with the bloc’s own migration pact.
