Council of Europe says asylum policies may put lives in danger

The Council of Europe urged its 46 member states on Thursday not to outsource the processing of asylum seekers to third countries, saying these people risked being tortured or killed. (AFP/File)

• Several European nations have begun outsourcing the handling of asylum seekers to countries outside the EU
• “Externalization policies might result in people being subjected to torture,” said O’Flaherty

STRASBOURG, France: The Council of Europe urged its 46 member states on Thursday not to outsource the processing of asylum seekers to third countries, saying these people risked being tortured or killed.
Several European nations have begun outsourcing the handling of asylum seekers to countries outside the European Union.
They include Italy, whose hard-right government opened migrant reception centers in Albania that have now morphed into repatriation outfits.
“Externalization policies might result in people being subjected to torture or other ill-treatment, collective expulsions and arbitrary detention or may put their lives in danger,” said the Council of Europe’s Commissioner for Human Rights, Michael O’Flaherty.
“Such policies might also hinder effective access to asylum and deprive individuals of legal remedies,” he said.
A new report by the council — Europe’s human rights watchdog — identifies three areas in which risks are “particularly acute.”
These are “external processing of asylum claims; external return procedures..; and the outsourcing of border control to other countries, some of which have a documented history of serious violations against people on the move.”
Last month, the EU Court of Justice ruled in favor of Italian judges who had ordered the repatriation to Italy of asylum seekers expelled to Albania by Giorgia Meloni’s government.
In 2022, the European Court of Human Rights, which is part of the Council of Europe, blocked the transfer of asylum seekers from the UK to Rwanda.
Britain, which has since formally left the EU, has now set up an agreement with France that provides for asylum seekers to be sent back from the UK to France.
Four African countries — Eswatini, Rwanda, South Sudan and Uganda — have agreed to accept migrants expelled en masse from the United States by the administration of President Donald Trump.
El Salvador was the first Latin American country to accept migrants deported from the United States.