Greece coordinating with EU on offshore migrant detention centers
Speaking to state broadcaster ERT, Plevris acknowledged that the repatriation process has proven increasingly challenging. He noted that arrivals continue to outpace deportations, while several countries of origin have been reluctant to readmit their nationals.
According to the minister, Greece is working in coordination with Germany, Austria, Netherlands and Denmark to establish facilities outside the European Union — “preferably in Africa.” Under the proposed framework, individuals whose asylum claims have been definitively rejected would be transferred to these centers if their home countries refuse to accept their return.
“When someone knows that they will be sent back to a detention center in a third country, that serves as a deterrent,” Plevris told ERT. Similar initiatives proposed elsewhere in Europe have drawn criticism from human rights organizations.
The minister also cautioned that protected status in Greece is not necessarily permanent. “Asylum is not a life-long status,” he said, stressing that protection may be reassessed if conditions in an individual’s country of origin change.
Plevris added that he has instructed asylum authorities to review the status of beneficiaries who have been arrested on suspicion of criminal activity — even if not convicted — or in cases where the original grounds for granting asylum no longer apply.
