‘Inhumane Model’: Italy's Plan to House Migrants in Albania

Italy continues its efforts to establish migrant detention centers in Albania, underscoring Rome's firm stance on illegal immigration.

Under a controversial agreement with Rome in November 2023, Tirana agreed to accept asylum seekers rescued at sea off Italy.

In this process, they are registered at a center in the Adriatic Sea and then transferred to another center inland while their applications are processed.

Italy and Migration

A migrant detention center has been completed in Shengjin, Albania, but the asylum processing center in Gjiader remains under construction with no set completion date announced.

The site in Gjiader was formerly a military airport, and the prefabricated buildings that have arrived are deemed suitable as offices for staff rather than for housing.

The two centers, managed by Italy, will have a maximum capacity of 3,000 asylum seekers.

According to the agreement, the centers were expected to be operational by spring 2024 and will remain under Italian jurisdiction for five years.

Under this law, Albania recognizes Italy's right to use certain areas, granted free of charge for the duration of the protocol, to build structures at the border or return ineligible migrants to their home countries.

Italy will cover the cost of building the centers as well as security and healthcare expenses, estimated at between 650 and 750 million euros over the first five years.

Albanian authorities will permit entry and stay in Albania for migrants welcomed at these facilities solely for border procedures or repatriation required by Italian and European laws.

If the right to stay in the facilities expires for any reason, the Italian side will immediately transfer the migrants out of Albanian territory.

The responsibility for transporting migrants to and from the facilities lies with the relevant Italian authorities.

Migrants will enter Albanian territory and waters exclusively through Italian authorities.

To ensure the right to defense, the parties will allow access to lawyers and their assistants, as well as international organizations and EU agencies that provide advice and assistance to asylum seekers, within the limits set by Italian, European, and international laws.

A real prison will also be built inside the Gjiader rescue center, with a maximum capacity of 20 detainees, for the possibility of holding some migrants in preventive detention.

The construction of this facility will cost $8 million, and a highly debated aspect involves sending 46 prison officers to Albania, more than two per detainee.

In January 2024, the Italian Parliament approved the agreement with the Chamber of Deputies supporting it with 155 votes, 115 opposed, and two abstentions.

Italy has long complained about insufficient assistance from its EU partners in managing migrants arriving from North Africa.

With its extensive Mediterranean coastline, Italy receives a high number of illegal arrivals. New data from the Ministry of the Interior of Italy, reported by local agency Nova on July 5, 2024, confirm a slowdown in migrant arrivals by sea in the first half of 2024.

At least 25,692 people arrived on Italian shores by July 5, a 60.85% decrease compared to 67,102 arrivals during the same period in 2023.

Most migrants come from Sub-Saharan Africa, Bangladesh, Syria, Tunisia, Guinea, Egypt, Pakistan, Gambia, Sudan, Mali, Ivory Coast, and other countries in smaller numbers.

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, from the right wing, is pushing for new measures in response to a 55% increase in migrants in 2024. Public concern over illegal migration across the Mediterranean was a key issue that brought Meloni from the far-right to power in 2022.

Thus, this model with Albania serves as a test of Meloni's position as she leads the third-largest economy in the EU.

Clear Obstacles

On June 3, 2024, Meloni visited Albania and announced that the designated sites for receiving and detaining migrants would host the first thousand migrants in August 2024. However, many doubt this timeline as construction is still underway at one of the sites.

Lawyer Loredana Leo, based in Rome and a member of an independent association working on migrant rights, told AFP on July 30, 2024, that she was not surprised by Italy’s failure to adhere to its plans for sending migrants to Albania. Leo had represented her association on a site visit to the proposed locations in June 2024.

During the five-day trip, the association met with various speakers, activists, and members of civil society organizations. Leo noted, "Construction was still ongoing, especially at the second site, known as Gjiader, so it was clear the work would not be completed in two months."

It is practically impossible to conduct assessments to identify vulnerable groups during sea rescue operations. While asylum seekers with special needs should be transported to Italy, identifying these groups before they reach Shengjin, Albania, is also challenging. Work at the Shengjin site is nearly complete.

Italian authorities announced that the centers are for adult men only, with vulnerable groups such as women, children, the elderly, and the sick remaining in Italy. Families will not be separated under this agreement. However, Leo mentioned that the general counsel overseeing the Italian centers indicated there are provisions concerning minors and pregnant women.

“The Italian government has not responded to our request to access the centers, so we cannot speak about living conditions there. The lack of clarity about practical procedures is extremely concerning,” Leo stated.

Processing asylum applications is expected to take about a month, allowing up to 36,000 asylum seekers to be sent to Albania annually.

In defense of the agreement, Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama stated on June 3, 2024, that Albania, seeking EU membership, "shows solidarity with the demographic problem facing Europe today." The Albanian parliament approved the agreement on February 22, 2024, with 77 votes in favor out of 140, while the opposition boycotted the vote.

Opposition leader Gazmend Bardhi criticized the migration agreement, stating that “it harms national security, territorial integrity, and public interest."

The Italian NGO Sea-Watch warned that, given current conditions in Italian administrative detention centers, the new centers in Albania are expected to be a further human rights disaster. The International Rescue Committee condemned the Rome-Tirana agreement as inhumane, while Amnesty International called it illegal and unimplementable.

The Italian Bishops' Conference also criticized the agreement as a "waste of money," accusing it of masking the government's failure to address the issue.

New Disaster

Albania, where Italy plans to detain migrants, is experiencing a mass exodus of its citizens at a rate of 50,000 people annually due to economic hardship.

According to a report by the Albanian Institute of Statistics (INSTAT) published on June 22, 2024, the population of Albania as of September 18, 2023, was about 2.5 million, a decrease of approximately half a million from 2011.

This decline has been ongoing since the 1990s, largely driven by emigration. Experts have pointed out that the Italy-Albania agreement might be impractical and potentially illegal from the start.

Under the Cutro decree approved by Meloni's government in May 2024, asylum applications from citizens of "safe" countries must be processed quickly, within a maximum of 28 days.

In Italy, asylum applications are reviewed by regional committees, and evaluated on a case-by-case basis, considering each migrant's situation and the risks they might face if their application is denied.

Satvinder Juss, a law professor at King's College London, noted, "Recently, there have been three failed attempts: the agreements between Tunisia and Italy, Britain and Rwanda, and Rwanda with Denmark—all of which were blocked." He further mentioned in an interview with Internazionale newspaper on January 22, 2024, that Greece also tried to make a deal with Albania but failed.

According to Juss, "28 days is an extremely short period to process asylum claims in Albania, which is still a migration country, with many people leaving to escape various forms of persecution."

He specifically referenced the UK-Rwanda agreement, which was recently rejected by the British Supreme Court. Juss argued that simply asserting Italy's oversight or EU law compliance is insufficient because Albania is a non-EU country and does not apply EU law.

He added that there are concerns about human rights violations in Albania and "it is not enough to rely on the assurances provided by the country."

Alfonso Celotto, a constitutional law professor at Rome Tre University, said that "the agreement with Albania threatens to limit protection measures and create discrimination. Migrants ending up in Albania might receive different treatment compared to those arriving in Italy." 

Celotto told Internazionale that “this could conflict with constitutional, international, and European law.”

He also pointed out unclear aspects of the agreement, such as the detention periods in Albania and where appeals can be made—whether in Tirana or Rome.

It is becoming evident that some European countries are seeking to offload asylum processing responsibilities by pushing other countries to accommodate migrants awaiting decisions on their applications.