In a significant blow to Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni's administration, Italian judges on Friday ruled against the government’s proposal to hold asylum seekers in Albania while their applications are being reviewed. This marks the third judicial rebuke since the right-wing government initiated the initiative in October, which aims to manage migration as a central element of its political agenda.
A court of appeals in Rome determined that the government could not continue with its plans to detain 43 migrants in Albania, who were intercepted in the Mediterranean Sea and transported there by the Italian Navy on Tuesday. The judges' ruling came ahead of a scheduled review by the Court of Justice of the European Union next month. Following this decision, a spokesman for the Interior Ministry indicated that the migrants would be brought back to Italy.
The Italian government's approach sought to process asylum claims more quickly by relocating groups of migrants to Italian-built facilities in Albania, specifying that only men deemed "non-vulnerable" from designated “safe countries” would be sent to these centers. The policy stipulated that women and minors would still have access to Italian shores.
While the government argues that this plan is essential to discourage perilous crossings of the Mediterranean, human rights organizations have denounced the initiative as harmful and in violation of international law. Additionally, political opponents have labeled the strategy as both ineffective and financially imprudent.
