A revised Italy-Albania Protocol, designed to allow the transfer of migrants for repatriation from Italy to Albania, has been agreed. Potentially enabling Prime Minister Georgia Meloni’s flagship immigration policy to break free of earlier court restrictions, the Italian Council of Ministers amended the legislation—again—on Friday, March 28th. Once a return decision is reached, an adult male migrant in Italy could now be removed to an Albania repatriation detention centre (‘CPRs’), pending deportation home or to a designated third safe country.
The new decree could allow Rome to overcome previous legal setbacks, bringing the Albanian Gjader centre—empty since October last year—into full use. Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi wants the institution swiftly reactivated while “not los[ing] its functions or be fundamentally altered.”
Like the courts, European Union member states will be watching the situation closely: lacking a genuine desire to fix illegal migration, increasingly Brussels sees such plans as a way to prevent populists from gaining more ground over the issue.
