The judges of the Court of Rome did not validate the detention of the 12 people detained since Wednesday in the migrant identification and repatriation centers built by Italy in Albania. This is a first major legal setback for the Giorgia Meloni government’s project, at the very moment when the European Union is opening up to the reproduction of this model, with the approval of the President of the European Commission, Ursula Von der Leyen.
This decision was influenced by a recent ruling by the Court of Justice of the European Union, according to which a country can only be considered safe if it is truly safe in its entirety. And the concept of “safe country” is at the heart of the implementation of the operational protocol signed a year ago by Italy and Albania for the opening of the centers: only adult men coming from countries considered safe should be sent there. The judgment of the Court of Justice of the EU of October 4 annulled de facto from the list to several countries, including Tunisia, Egypt and Bangladesh. The 16 migrants initially taken to Albania – four of them returned to Italy within hours of arriving in Albania, two because they were minors and two because they were considered “vulnerable” – were Egyptians and Bangladeshis.
“The refusal to validate detentions in Albanian installations assimilated to Italian border or transit zones is due to the impossibility of recognizing the States of origin of the detained persons as “safe countries”, with the consequence of the inapplicability of the border procedure and “as provided for in the protocol, the transfer out of Albanian territory of migrants, who therefore have the right to be taken to Italy”, explained in a press release Luciana Sangiovanni, the president of section 13 of the Tribunal from Rome. decided not to support the detention of this first group of migrants in the centers.
One of the key points of the agreement between Italy and Albania, as repeatedly repeated by the Albanian Prime Minister, Edi Rama, was that under no circumstances could migrants leave the centers, considered by Albania as enclaves under Italian jurisdiction. .
