EU Gives Green Light to Deport Illegal Immigrants From Designated Safe States

The European Union has published the first list of safe countries as part of the introduction of new immigration laws that will allow nations to deport illegal immigrants from the 27-nation bloc.

India, Bangladesh, Colombia, Egypt, Morocco, Tunisia, and Kosovo are on the list, although Kosovo is not recognized as a state by Serbia—from which it seceded in 2008—or by a number of nations, including five EU members.

It means that from June 12, when the laws take effect, an illegal immigrant arriving in the EU from one of the six countries on the list—all of which are functioning democracies—will be unable to file an asylum application.

In December, the EU published figures showing that 1,725 people from Morocco and 1,705 from Egypt had applied for asylum in the bloc in Sept. 2025.

Cyprus currently holds the presidency of the EU, and Cypriot Deputy Minister for Migration and International Protection Nicholas A. Ioannides said in a statement, “This first-ever common EU list of safe countries of origin and the revised safe country concept will support faster, more consistent asylum procedures.”

Committed to ‘Timely Delivery’

“They contribute to the materialisation of the migration and asylum pact and mark a concrete step towards its implementation. We are committed to its timely delivery,” Ioannides added.

On Feb. 10, in a vote at the European Parliament in Strasbourg, France, lawmakers approved the new laws that will allow EU nations to deport illegal immigrants because they either hail from a country considered safe or could apply for asylum in a country outside the bloc.

The vote ratified a decision taken last December in Brussels by EU ministers.

The new laws will allow for the deportation of people back to countries they transitioned through—and could have claimed asylum in—before moving on to the EU country that refused their claim.

For example, if an illegal immigrant travels through Greece, Croatia, Slovenia, and Austria to arrive in Germany, the German courts can now deport the person.

“The safe third country concept allows EU member states to reject an asylum application as inadmissible (without examining its substance) when asylum seekers could have sought and, if eligible, received international protection in a non-EU country that is considered safe for them,” the EU said in a statement.

“The legislation broadens and clarifies the grounds for declaring applications inadmissible on the basis of the concept.”

The new rules could eventually enable the 27 member states to set up deportation centers, sometimes called “return hubs,” outside the EU, similar to those established in Albania by Italy.

Levels of illegal immigration into the EU fell from a high of more than a million in 2015 to 121,303 in 2019, the last year before the COVID-19 pandemic. But it rose again after the pandemic to 275,047 in 2023, before falling again to 154,502 last year.

But on Feb. 10, when the laws were passed by the European Parliament, Amnesty International’s Olivia Sundberg Diez described it as a “dark day for human rights” in the EU.