Why Europe is once again divided over migrants. Prof. Spitaleri speaks out

"There are no official assessments yet, but it is fair to say that Europe is in serious trouble over the new Migration and Asylum Pact." Amid announcements of deportations of Dublin-designated asylum seekers, the suspension of the Schengen Agreement and tensions between EU governments, Fabio Spitaleri, Professor of European Union Law at the University of Trieste, has a clear picture of our continent when it comes to immigration. "Managing the situation is very complicated, but if you take the oil out of the cogs and put sand in, the system as a whole stops working. The easiest way out is to restart cooperation between governments, perhaps with the help of the European Commission. Furthermore, I see the establishment of hubs in third countries as difficult, both in terms of administration and costs, and above all because of the lack of guarantees that standards will not lead to inhuman or degrading treatment.”

In fact, over the last twenty days – that is, since the Ceuta crisis, when around 80,000 migrants entered the country between 30 and 31 July – Italy suspended the Schengen Agreement with Spain – initially on a one-way basis and then reciprocally – in addition to an extraordinary meeting of EU interior ministers to address the migration crisis, called for by twenty-two member states, led by Italy and Denmark, on the unusual right-left axis formed by Meloni and Frederiksen, which brought their divisions to the surface once again, and finally the reopening of the case concerning ‘Dublin migrants’, that is, migrants who will have to return to the country of first entry so that their application for international protection can be examined.

The date to mark in red is 12 June, when the new Pact on Migration and Asylum came into force. This is where the dispute arises: Rome maintains that the resumption applies only to those who entered the system after that date, whilst Berlin and Vienna argue that it also applies to those who were already there. In the case of ‘Dublin cases’, it was initially Germany that announced the transfer of three migrants to Italy. Then it was Switzerland’s turn, which spoke of hundreds of people to be returned to the authorities in Rome. Next, Austria took action, moving from words to deeds. Last, in chronological order, came Finland and Sweden. Today, the Ministry of the Interior in Helsinki announced that “transfers based on the new EU Pact on Asylum are currently being prepared”. 

According to the APA news agency, citing sources from the Ministry of the Interior in Vienna, Austria reportedly deported four asylum seekers to Italy yesterday using public transport, with the Austrian authorities providing the migrants with train or bus tickets. And this time, the government will not be able to block these returns, as it did from 5 December 2022 to 31 December 2025. According to the circular from the Ministry of the Interior, Italy has, in fact, rejected 80,000 requests to take charge of Dublin cases during this period; however, Spitaleri points out that since March 2026 the situation has changed following the European Court of Justice’s ruling on the Daraa case “which essentially states that this practice is not lawful because a state cannot unilaterally refuse to accept transfer requests, as this is inconsistent with the provisions of the 1990 Dublin Agreement – as updated over the years – and with those of the new regulation on the management of immigration and asylum. But whilst this is one aspect, there is also the issue that if these transfers are not completed within six months, the person who requested them then finds themselves having to process the application for international protection themselves: we are in a state of deadlock”. The Court also points to the remedy: the Commission or another Member State may bring an action for failure to fulfil obligations; this is the factor that makes the risk for Italy a tangible one.

The case of Ceuta, whilst formally different, is essentially similar and raises another issue: that of the exploitation of immigration, that is, the use of this phenomenon "as a weapon to create instability. “Think of Turkey, Belarus, but also Libya,” adds the professor. Rather than closing the borders between individual EU countries, we should focus on these other potential flashpoints. “Effective action would require a number of things. Instead of reinstating internal border controls, joint measures coordinated by Frontex should be implemented: this would provide a different kind of response to that of internal mistrust. It is clear that, in certain cases, cooperation with third countries can be another pillar of this complex strategy, although there must be vigilance regarding serious violations of people’s fundamental rights, because we are obviously talking about countries whose level of democracy is certainly different from our own.”

And on the subject of third countries, one of the proposals mooted at the Ministry of the Interior was to create hubs for non-EU repatriation, thereby exporting the ‘Albania model’ to certain African countries such as Rwanda and Uganda. The idea, in essence, is to detain or transfer applicants for international protection to these offshore centres so that their applications can be assessed there. At present, nothing is certain yet, but, as Spitaleri argues, “the management of these centres is very complex and very costly, and gradually, with overcrowding and prolonged detention, they risk becoming centres where standards for the protection of people’s fundamental rights are progressively eroded. So I see it as very complicated, both in terms of setting them up, managing them and the costs involved, and above all because of the lack of guarantees regarding legal standards”.