Return Hubs in European Migration Policy

The EU Return Regulation creates a legal basis for transferring individuals subject to enforceable return decisions to third countries willing to accept them – even where they have no prior connection to that country. This makes so-called return hubs an increasingly likely prospect.

Their political appeal is clear: return hubs offer governments a visible way to demonstrate enforcement at a moment when the EU Pact on Migration and Asylum depends on credible implementation. However, as noted by three researchers from the German Institute for International and Security Affairs, political salience should not be mistaken for operational effectiveness.

European precedents suggest that transfers to third countries are likely to remain marginal, expensive and dependent on tenuous bargains. Return hubs may play a limited role for a small group of people who are otherwise difficult or impossible to remove, but they are not a general solution to low return rates.

Return hubs are intended for individuals who are already subject to an enforceable return decision. That sets them apart from inadmissibility procedures, including the safe-third-country concept, and offshore asylum processing.

Return hubs present with a number of key associated risks.

A first one is diminished scrutiny after transfer. In ordinary return procedures, key legal risks are assessed before removal, including access to remedies and protection against arbitrary detention or inhuman treatment. In a return hub arrangement, by contrast, some of the most serious risks may arise only after the person has left EU territory.

Another risk is that a hub adds value only if it produces lawful and durable outcomes for people whose return could not be achieved through existing channels. Yet prospective host States are least likely to accept those whose return is hardest to resolve.

A third risk is that fixed costs, negotiated capacity and political sponsorship could encourage transfers to return hubs even in cases where direct return to the country of origin might have been achieved through assisted voluntary return or reintegration support.

A fourth risk is policy entrapment. Return hub agreements require diplomatic concessions, infrastructure, funding, and political capital. Once these costs have been incurred, poor results may lead not to closure, but to attempts to rescue the project through higher payments, weaker safeguards or diplomatic/political concessions.

A fifth risk lies in a potential inversion of priorities. The core return system depends on determination of nationality, documentation, consular cooperation, direct return, readmission diplomacy, case management, voluntary return support, and reintegration.

Return hubs may have a limited role for a small subset of people who cannot otherwise be returned. But they should not become the principal symbol of a return policy, whose performance will stay dependent on cooperation with countries of origin, assisted voluntary return, documentation, readmission and arrangements with neighboring and transit States.

The hub cannot solve these issues completely. It just serves to conceal them by creating an expensive mechanism for relocating unresolved cases to third countries. Unfortunately, not all European politicians realize that it is easier to correct the existing migration system than to create a crude new one.

Original publication: https://www.swp-berlin.org/en/publication/return-hubs-in-european-migration-policy