ATHENS — Greece is spearheading a group of five EU countries pushing for migrants who have been denied the right to stay in the EU to be sent to countries such as Rwanda from as early as next year. Greece’s Migration Minister Thanos Plevris said in an interview that by the first half of 2027, the so-called Core Group of nations — Denmark, Austria, Greece, Germany and the Netherlands — aims to have a pilot project in place to send rejected asylum-seekers to designated countries outside the bloc. He added that the project should be fully operational by the second half of the year — coinciding with Greece taking over the rotating presidency of the Council of the EU in July.
The intervention comes as Europe continues to grapple with a decade-long migration crisis which has galvanized support for populist-nationalist parties across the continent. Plevris emphasized that the plan does not entail establishing return facilities but rather designates return countries. Uganda and Uzbekistan are also reportedly under discussion as possible return countries.
Plevris said the countries under consideration already have large migrant populations and camps to accommodate them, adding that the Core Group nations “are open to whatever framework the countries there want — whether they want to talk about camps, or broader integration programs.” Rwanda has been at the center of various offshore migration plans. In 2022, the U.K. announced a controversial multimillion-pound deal with Kigali to deport asylum-seekers to the country to have their claims processed. The scheme was abandoned after years of legal challenges.
The timetable proposed by Plevris might be ambitious, given that several crucial elements of the agreement remain up in the air. The minister said members of the Core Group are currently in discussions with international organizations to establish monitoring processes that would ensure human rights are respected in third countries to which migrants will be deported. The minister acknowledged that the plan would not lead to huge numbers of migrants being outsourced to third countries.
Even though other countries have attempted something similar in the past, this is the first time it’s being attempted since the EU regulation was passed.” On Thursday, at a meeting of EU interior ministers, Plevris will also submit Greece’s plan to deal with emergency migratory pressures — temporarily suspending asylum applications for newly arrived people. Greece’s Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis first presented this idea in an Op-Ed published on POLITICO after tens of thousands of migrants crossed the border into Spain’s North African territory of Ceuta. Greece has been repeatedly accused of violating EU regulations for alleged illegal pushbacks of migrants.
Plevris, who has expressed hard-line views on migration, has expressed his support and admiration for U.S. President Donald Trump’s approach on the issue. He also confirmed that European prosecutors are investigating how Greece used EU funds to construct migrant camps.
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