EU lawmakers to approve migrant detention and deportation boost

STRASBOURG

Police conduct a search operation at a makeshift camp of migrants who want to cross the English Channel to Britain near Dunkirk, northern France, Wednesday, May 27, 2026. (AP Photo/Jean-Francois Badias)

European lawmakers gave final approval on June 17 to tougher migration rules that will grant authorities broader powers to detain irregular arrivals and allow for the creation of deportation centers outside the bloc.

The vote in Strasbourg was one of the last hurdles for a reform that has sailed through the EU’s notoriously long legislative process as Brussels and member states respond to political pressure to curb migration.

“This regulation tells everybody that it is us and not the smugglers deciding who can stay in the European Union and who must leave,” said Magnus Brunner, the EU’s commissioner for migration.

Criticized by human rights groups, the text notably enables nations to open “return hubs” outside the EU’s borders, where migrants with no right to stay could be sent, something a group of countries is raring to do.

Denmark, Austria, Greece, Germany and the Netherlands and others have already been exploring options to set hubs up.

Until recently a fringe idea, the plan got further endorsement on June 16, when a majority of EU nations agreed to seek to secure EU money to run such centers in a move opposed by France and Spain.

“Our goal is to conclude the first agreements for the creation of these structures in 2026, so that they are operational from 2027,” Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said on June 14.

European governments have sought a tougher stance amid a souring of public opinion on migration that has fueled far-right electoral gains across the continent.
With migrant arrivals down in 2025, the focus in Brussels has turned to improving the repatriation system, which currently sees less than 30 percent of people ordered to leave actually returned to their country of origin.

“This marks the end of decades of powerlessness in the face of illegal immigration,” center-right French EU lawmaker Francois-Xavier Bellamy said of the reform.

Besides return hubs, the new measures establish a strict obligation for migrants subject to expulsion to leave and cooperate with authorities to that end.
Those who do not, or who pose a security risk or are thought to be at risk of absconding, can be detained for up to two years.

Under the new rules authorities would be allowed to search third-country nationals, their homes or other “relevant premises” and seize personal belongings, in their push to ensure the return of irregular migrants.

Alessandro Zan of the center-left S&D group described the reform as “a dark chapter for Europe.”

After winning parliamentary approval the law will need a formal green light from member states, which have already provisionally endorsed it, before coming into force.

Most new measures will apply immediately after that and some provisions 12 months later.