The EU Builds a Deportation System Beyond Its Borders
The European Parliament approved two measures on February 10, 2026, by votes of 396-226 and 408-184, that together construct what amounts to an externalized deportation infrastructure, a system designed to process asylum seekers outside EU territory and legal jurisdiction. The votes designated seven countries as "safe" for returns and established the legal framework for offshore "return hubs," accelerating implementation of the 2023 Migration Pact that wasn't due to take full effect until June 2026. Center-right and far-right lawmakers allied to push through changes that fundamentally alter where asylum decisions happen and who bears responsibility for the consequences.
How the Externalization Machine Works
The new system operates through three interlocking mechanisms that together push asylum processing beyond EU borders. First, seven countries, Bangladesh, Colombia, Egypt, India, Kosovo, Morocco, and Tunisia, are now designated as "safe," meaning EU member states can reject asylum applications from anyone who could have received protection there. Second, asylum seekers can be sent to third countries they merely transited through, provided those countries are deemed to respect international standards, even if the asylum seeker has no prior ties to that country. Third, the measures move the EU closer to establishing "return hubs" outside its territory, modeled on facilities Italy has already built in Albania to process asylum-seekers caught near Italian waters. The system creates a deportation assembly line where the decision happens in Brussels, the processing happens in Albania or similar hubs, and the final destination is a country designated safe by parliamentary vote rather than ground-level assessment.
The mechanism's power lies in its geographic displacement of accountability. Under the 1951 convention, the EU cannot return asylum seekers to countries where they could be in danger. But by designating transit countries as "safe" and building processing infrastructure outside EU borders, the system creates legal distance between the initial decision and the eventual outcome. An asylum seeker who fled Syria, transited through Tunisia, and arrived in Greece can now be sent back to Tunisia, not because Tunisia is their home, but because it appears on a list approved in Strasbourg. What happens after that return falls outside the EU's direct legal responsibility, even though the return itself was designed and executed by EU policy.
The Evidence Contradicts the Designation
The "safe country" designations collide with documented reality on the ground, particularly in Morocco and Tunisia. Migrants in both countries have faced widespread abuse and mistreatment, including being expelled into remote desert zones in Tunisia, according to multiple reports. Italian lawmaker Cecilia Strada of the Socialists and Democrats Group voted against the designations, pointing to the gap between parliamentary classification and lived experience. The contradiction isn't incidental, it's structural. The safe country list functions as an administrative tool that overrides individual circumstances, allowing bulk processing based on route rather than risk.
The timing reveals political rather than humanitarian logic. More than one million refugees and migrants, mainly from Syria, arrived in the EU via the Mediterranean during 2015-16. That two-year crisis generated a decade of political pressure that has now crystallized into infrastructure. Anti-immigration rhetoric has surged throughout the EU since 2015, broadening popular support for far-right parties and shifting the center-right toward policies that would have been politically unthinkable before the crisis. The current measures aren't a response to present conditions, 2026 arrival numbers are a fraction of 2015 levels, but rather a delayed architectural response to a crisis that has already passed. The system being built is designed to prevent a repeat of 2015, regardless of whether current migration patterns justify it.
The Offshore Infrastructure Takes Shape
Italy's Albania facilities serve as the prototype for what the new rules will enable across the EU. Under a deal between Rome and Tirana, asylum-seekers caught near Italian waters are processed in Albanian territory, creating a buffer zone where EU asylum law applies but EU oversight becomes logistically difficult. The February votes move the entire EU closer to replicating this model, though specific regulations on return hub operations remain under parliamentary discussion. The lack of finalized rules is itself revealing, the EU has approved the concept and designated the countries before establishing the safeguards that might constrain how the system operates.
The return hub concept solves a political problem for EU governments: how to maintain the appearance of asylum system compliance while dramatically reducing the number of people who successfully claim protection. Processing happens outside EU territory, reducing domestic political visibility. Rejections can be blamed on third-country determinations rather than EU decisions. And the physical infrastructure, facilities, staff, transportation networks, gets built in countries with lower labor costs and less media scrutiny. The system externalizes not just the processing but the controversy, creating what amounts to an offshore asylum apparatus that mirrors how corporations use offshore financial structures to reduce tax liability.
The Accountability Void Opens
The new system creates distance between decision and consequence in ways that make accountability nearly impossible to enforce. When the EU designates Tunisia as safe and an asylum seeker gets returned there, who verifies that the person isn't subsequently expelled into the desert? The designation happens in Strasbourg, the return happens through bilateral agreements, and the final outcome happens in Tunisian territory beyond EU jurisdiction. The 1951 convention's prohibition on returns to danger becomes unenforceable when the danger occurs two steps removed from the initial EU decision.
This architectural approach to avoiding accountability follows a pattern visible across recent EU policy: create systems where the harmful outcome happens out of frame. Like Denmark's decision to store radioactive waste in facilities the public cannot access, or corporate supply chains that push labor abuses to subcontractors, the externalized asylum system works precisely because it's designed not to be watched. The abuse isn't a system failure, it's a system feature. If processing happened in Frankfurt or Paris, media access and legal challenges would be straightforward. In Albanian facilities processing claims under Italian jurisdiction, or in Moroccan detention centers holding people rejected under EU safe country designations, oversight becomes a logistical and jurisdictional maze.
What Happens When the Machine Starts Running
The measures require final formal approval from the 27 EU member governments before taking effect, but that step is procedural rather than substantive, the political decision has already been made. Implementation is expected in June 2026, just four months away. That timeline means the infrastructure must be built, staff hired, bilateral agreements finalized, and transportation logistics established in a matter of months. The rush suggests political urgency disconnected from operational readiness, raising questions about whether safeguards will be in place before the system goes live.
Once operational, the system will be nearly impossible to dismantle. Return hubs represent physical infrastructure and diplomatic agreements that create institutional momentum. Staff will be hired, budgets allocated, facilities maintained. Countries hosting the hubs will develop economic dependencies on the arrangements. And most critically, the system will generate its own justification, once thousands of asylum seekers have been processed through offshore facilities, any attempt to bring processing back onshore will be framed as inviting chaos. The February votes didn't just change asylum policy; they built machinery that will shape EU migration response for decades, long after the political coalition that created it has dissolved.
The externalized deportation system reveals how democracies create plausible deniability: design infrastructure that pushes consequences beyond borders and accountability, then point to the infrastructure as inevitable. The abuse happens elsewhere, under someone else's flag, but by EU design and EU funding. The 2015-16 crisis created political pressure for a solution. The solution being implemented doesn't address why people flee or how to build adequate processing capacity. Instead, it addresses how to make asylum seekers someone else's problem, preferably somewhere cameras don't reach and lawyers can't easily follow.