Why immigration is back on the European Union’s agenda

EU leaders are meeting in Brussels today with migration firmly back at the top of the agenda. Here’s a brief look at why that’s happened – and what the European Commission, as well as national capitals, might be thinking of doing about it.

Why has immigration become such a big issue again?

Only this April , the EU finalised its new “asylum and migration pact” after almost a decade of often fraught negotiations following the migration crisis of 2015 and 2016, during which almost 2 million people, mostly Syrian refugees, arrived in the bloc.

Criticised by rights groups, the pact aims to strengthen the EU’s external borders and accelerate returns of unsuccessful asylum applicants, while also spreading the financial and practical burden of resettlement more fairly among member states.

Nonetheless, and despite the fact that irregular immigration into the EU is a fraction of what it was in 2015 (and has fallen more than 35% so far this year compared with 2023), a new anti-immigration mood is sweeping the bloc, driven in large part by the electoral success of far-right parties.

Anti-immigration, far-right and national conservative parties are in power in seven EU countries, from Finland to Italy, and propping up a minority government in Sweden. The far-right FPÖ (Eurosceptic Freedom party) topped Austria’s recent vote and the AfD (Alternative für Deutschland) has made historic gains in Germany.

In France , Marine Le Pen’s National Rally holds the fate of the government – whose prime minister has described current immigration levels as “often insufferable” – in its hands. And in Hungary, Viktor Orbán rails against “outrageous and unacceptable” EU migration policy.

What anti-immigration steps are national governments taking?

Germany, long seen as relatively liberal on migration, has tightened its asylum laws and last month reimposed checks at all nine of its land borders, a move widely seen as threatening the EU’s prized principle of free movement and its passport-free Schengen zone.

It is not alone. Citing terrorist threats and overwhelmed asylum systems, seven other Schengen countries have also reintroduced border controls. The Netherlands has unveiled what it calls “the strictest admissions rules in the EU”.

Poland’s prime minister, Donald Tusk, said last weekend he wanted to go further by suspending the right to asylum for people crossing from Belarus in an effort to cut irregular migration to “a minimum” and “regain 100% control over who enters and leaves”.

That follows a similar move taken by Finland for people arriving from Russia, with both Warsaw and Helsinki complaining that Minsk and Moscow are actively helping people, mainly from Africa the Middle East, to try to enter the EU in a form of “hybrid warfare”.

Last week Italy opened two centres in Albania where it will hold men trying to cross from Africa to Europe while their asylum applications are processed by Rome, a move described by the prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, as a “a new, courageous and unprecedented path”.

What options are being discussed at EU level?

A number of ideas are on the table, none clearly defined but most involving some form of “offshoring” the problem – removing it, as far as possible, beyond the EU’s borders in something reminiscent of, though not as radical as, the UK’s ill-fated Rwanda scheme .

Under the Rwanda scheme, irregular immigrants would have been sent to the African country for their asylum demands to be processed – and stayed there even if successful. That is not so far being publicly discussed in the EU, but offshore processing and detention centres are.

“Hotspots”, “migration centres” or “return hubs” are assorted terms for facilities in third countries where asylum seekers can be held while their requests are assessed (in an EU state or on site), or to which people who arrive without documentation or have had their applications rejected can be deported before being returned to their home countries.

Also being discussed are more of the kind of “partnership deals” that the EU and individual members states such as Italy have sealed with countries such as Turkey , Tunisia and Libya, which are aimed essentially at dissuading people from trying to leave for Europe in the first place.

Many member states – 14 of which, including France and Germany, have signed a letter demanding a tough “paradigm shift” on migration – also want to see a big improvement in the “rate of returns”, the number of people deported after being denied asylum.

The commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, has already promised action on this last point, including new legislation. She has also said it is time for the bloc to look at “return hubs” outside the EU, without defining how they might work or where they might be.

Although some European leaders have openly wondered whether Italy’s Albania deal could be replicated at EU level, the Albanian prime minister, Edi Rama, has repeatedly insisted that it is only for Italy.

With countries such as Italy pushing to be able to return migrants to, for example, Syria, von der Leyen has further said that the commission is open to reviewing the EU’s list of “designated safe third countries”.

What might be the outcome?

The summit’s draft conclusions suggest that there could be a statement asking the commission to take steps urgently to increase return rates, as well as find “new ways to prevent and counter irregular migration”, but this is by no means certain.

It will take many more meetings before the bloc arrives at a new set of common policies. In the meantime, national governments will continue to take unilateral measures ( according to Dutch media , The Hague would like to deport people to Uganda).

The EU’s new pact on migration and asylum, meanwhile, due to take effect over the coming two years, has already been weakened, with many now arguing that it is not tough enough on deportation, and both the Netherlands and Hungary demanding opt-outs.

Attempts to extend or replicate external partnership deals, for instance paying countries such as Tunisia and Libya to contain and return irregular migrants trying to cross the Mediterranean, will again be heavily criticised by NGOs after revelations of serious human rights abuses there.

“Hotspots” and “return hubs”, however defined, are equally controversial, with activists and researchers questioning whether they are, as proponents suggest, humane and effective – or even legal – compared with a well-funded, EU-based asylum system. Four of the first 16 migrants Italy sent to Albania this week were sent back because they could have been minors or had health concerns.

More practically, besides Albania’s deal with Italy and a small-scale agreement between Denmark and Kosovo , few if any non-EU countries have said they might be willing to host such centres. Some diplomats suspect that for this reason alone the idea may be a non-starter.