“Non-EU hubs for repatriation? Unworkable – just look at the case of Albania.” Gabrielli speaks out

“There is no doubt that we must commit to combating human trafficking, but we need to exercise caution regarding solutions that are all too often portrayed as panaceas,” says former police chief Franco Gabrielli on the day that, at the meeting of EU interior ministers following the Ceuta crisis, Italy put forward its proposal to “Europeanise” the Albanian model, with extraterritorial hubs also in Africa, where migrants awaiting the outcome of their asylum applications could be housed and from where, if their applications are rejected, they could be repatriated.

Gabrielli is not convinced by the proposal: “Given past experience,” says the former police chief, “it does not strike me as a readily viable solution. But we are now well and truly in the post-truth era.” And indeed, neither the Italian centres in Gjader and Shengjin nor the similar British attempts to set up hubs in Rwanda have gone particularly well. The latter are a project abandoned by the United Kingdom, whilst the Albanian centres have been converted into repatriation centres (CPRs) for migrants whose asylum applications have already been rejected. Both have had to contend, through the courts, with national, European and international law.

However, the Italian government is now convinced that, with the new European Pact on Asylum, the EU list of safe countries and a call to amend the rules of the European Convention on Human Rights (the Chișinău Declaration), the legal obstacles can be overcome. And that’s not all. Although the EU Commission is not currently committing either funds or political support to the extraterritorial hubs, other countries – from Germany to Denmark, and from Austria to the Netherlands – have shown interest in the model. But this argument does not convince Gabrielli, who believes that it is not the judges – whether Italian or European – who are the main obstacle to the hubs’ actual effectiveness. “The main problem,” says Gabrielli, “is the relationship with the countries of origin. At the centre in Albania, despite its conversion into a CPR, the actual deportation rate stands at 15 per cent – even lower than in Italy.” In short, argues the former police chief, these centres would quickly fill up with migrants who cannot be repatriated.

 “The issue is complex and should not be addressed solely in terms of supposed firmness or deterrence. Furthermore,” he continues, “there is an apparent contradiction in what is happening: the number of arrivals is falling, yet people are crying ‘invasion’. Meanwhile, on both the right and the left, nothing is being done to promote integration, given that even this government has admitted that foreign workers are needed (450,000 under the immigration quota decree). Perhaps, more simply, Vannacci is knocking on the door.”