The European Union has announced a further tightening of migration and asylum policy. The “Migration and Asylum Pact” (CEAS) was already adopted in 2024, which is now being translated into national law and supplemented by operational decisions of the EU interior ministers. The aim is to further expand “Fortress Europe” and significantly accelerate deportations.
The consequences will be drastic. Thousands of migrants already die at Europe’s external borders every year—especially in the Mediterranean. Those who make it to Europe are to be deported again as quickly as possible. To this end, the EU wants to establish so-called “multipurpose centres” or “return hubs”—euphemisms for concentration camps—along the flight routes to systematically undermine the rights that migrants and asylum seekers formally enjoy within the European Union. Refugees are to be stopped by force and deported.
The EU and national officials responsible make no secret of their plans. “We must use all the means at our disposal if we want to decide who is allowed into the European Union and who has to leave it again,” announced EU Commissioner Brunner. According to the statement of the German Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt (Christian Social Union, CSU), the guiding question of EU refugee policy is “How can we bring more incisiveness and more rigour into the common European asylum policy?” Essentially by implementing the programme of the fascists.
A list of so-called “safe countries of origin” was compiled last year, which includes Egypt, Morocco and Tunisia, India, Bangladesh, Colombia and Kosovo. The majority to pass the new regulations was achieved in the European Parliament with the votes of the conservative European People’s Party (EPP) and the right-wing extremist parties. Asylum seekers from these so-called “safe countries of origin” are in future to face a “fast-track procedure” with the declared aim of being able to carry out deportations to these countries. In addition, the possibilities for deportation detention are being tightened and an EU-wide “return order” introduced.
In addition to the “safe countries of origin,” the European interior ministers have also agreed on a concept for what constitutes “safe third countries.” Rejected asylum seekers are in future to be deported more easily to these countries, even if they have no connection there—for example, through family or friends—and the country was not on the flight route of the asylum seeker. This has created the conditions to deport refugees to so-called “safe third countries” to which they previously had no connection.
The Netherlands has already concluded an agreement to this end with Uganda to set up a so-called “transit camp” or “return hub” in the East African country. Asylum seekers who do not receive asylum in the Netherlands and cannot return to their countries of origin or be deported there are thus to be accommodated in camps in Uganda to possibly return from there to their countries of origin at an indeterminate time.
Uganda currently hosts around 1.9 million refugees, predominantly from regional conflict zones such as South Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Although the country is praised for its generous reception of refugees in the region, it is one of the poorest countries in the world, with a gross domestic product of around $900 per capita per year. About 60 percent of the population—whether born in the country or immigrated—live in absolute poverty, according to the World Bank. Democratic rights are not secured in Uganda, especially for the political opposition. Homosexuality is prosecuted with long prison sentences; a new law even provides for the possibility of the death penalty for homosexual acts.
The Dutch Minister of Immigration and Foreign Affairs David van Weel (VVD) has dismissed concerns regarding the human rights situation: “We work closely with Uganda and pay around 100 million euros in development aid per year. ... Frankly: all countries in the region do not have the standards of the Netherlands.” Care would be taken, he claimed, to ensure “that people we send to these transit camps are not persecuted on the basis of political opinion or sexual identity,” said van Weel.
Following this push by the Netherlands in autumn 2025, a working group has meanwhile formed within the EU, consisting of Germany, Greece, Austria, Denmark and the Netherlands, to establish joint “return hubs.” At a meeting of EU interior ministers in Nicosia, Cyprus, it was agreed to develop a roadmap as to which third countries “innovative models” should be developed with, according to Interior Minister Dobrindt. In addition to Uganda, “Tunisia is also repeatedly mentioned,” the press reports. The news programme “Tagesschau” also names Libya as a possible “safe third country”—a country in which torture and systematic violence against women, migrants and opposition members are widely documented. According to media reports, Denmark has also initiated talks on corresponding agreements with Ethiopia and Egypt, so far without concrete results. The human rights situation in these countries is also catastrophic.
Previously, Italy had already concluded an agreement with Albania to set up refugee camps there. Two Italian “reception centres” were established in the port of Shëngjin and at the Gjadër military airfield, in which refugees are to await the outcome of their asylum procedures. Italian courts have repeatedly restricted this practice, and the originally planned implementation—bringing intercepted refugees to Albania via fast-track procedures and deporting them—has so far not been feasible. The latest decisions at EU level, however, strengthen the position of right-wing extremist Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, who uses these camps as a deterrent. A majority of the Italian population opposes the camps.
EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, on the other hand, described the Italian-Albanian agreement as an “innovative way to combat illegal migration.” Prime Minister Keir Starmer also showed interest in the model after national courts stopped the British plan to transfer asylum seekers to Rwanda during their proceedings.
Human rights organisations have sharply criticised the plans of the European Union. On the one hand, the concept of “safe countries of origin” undermines the individual right to asylum, since it is generally assumed that refugees cannot put forward any reasons worthy of protection. Asylum seekers can hardly defend themselves against this insinuation, especially in fast-track procedures, as the burden is placed on them to prove the persecution they have suffered. The procedure is thus directed “in case of doubt, against the asylum seeker.”
The planned deportation of refugees to so-called “safe third countries” such as Uganda, Tunisia, Libya or Ethiopia undermines the human and fundamental rights of asylum seekers in every respect. The same applies to plans for so-called “multipurpose centres” along flight routes, for example in Turkey. There, refugees are to be accommodated in camps whose conditions can hardly be controlled and, given the economic and humanitarian situation of the affected countries of origin, are highly likely to be inhumane. With a few hundred million euros in “development aid,” and via agreements with corrupt and compliant regimes, the EU is attempting to buy itself free of responsibility—for people seeking protection in Europe from wars, conflicts and the catastrophic consequences of a policy for which the EU is also largely responsible.
The EU is thus increasingly adopting the programme of right-wing extremist forces, which are gaining influence in almost all European countries under targeted promotion by the ruling elites. This is particularly evident in the example of the Netherlands: the idea of a deportation camp in Uganda was already put forward in 2024 by the then Minister for Development Aid, Reinette Klever of the right-wing extremist Party for Freedom (PVV), during a visit to East Africa. However, since autumn 2025 it has been implemented by a government to which the PVV no longer belongs. Research by news channel RTL Nieuws also found that plans for deportation camps outside the EU had already been discussed under Prime Minister Mark Rutte.
Right-wing extremist forces are being built up throughout Europe to enforce a programme of rearmament and social cuts. Refugees and migrants serve as scapegoats to divert social anger into racist channels. Ultimately, however, the hollowing out of human rights is directed not only against refugees, but against the entire working class. What is being tested today on the weakest—disenfranchisement, deportation and internment in camps—can be directed tomorrow against broad sections of the population when resistance against war and social cuts grows.