On Friday morning, a court in Rome rejected the detention orders for 12 migrants recently transferred to controversial asylum centers in Albania, established by the Italian government to manage immigration. The group was part of an initial wave of 16 men sent to these facilities, but doubts about their stay had already surfaced, with four of them previously returned to Italy for not meeting the required criteria. Italy’s Interior Minister, Matteo Piantedosi, announced the government would appeal the court’s decision.
Upon their arrival in Albania, the 12 men were transferred to a facility in Gjader, a town in the Lezhë municipality, where Italy has built a migrant reception center. Despite the center being in Albania, the legal procedures, including administrative detention and asylum claims, remain under Italian jurisdiction. Every migrant transferred to Albania requires a detention order from the Rome police, which must then be validated by the 18th section of the Rome Civil Court. However, the court refused to confirm these orders, citing structural issues with Albania’s migrant reception process.
The ruling means that the 12 migrants must return to Italy. According to Italy’s Interior Ministry, the migrants are expected to be brought back “soon.” Reports from the Italian news agency ANSA suggest that they could be transported as early as Saturday to the southern port city of Bari.
Giorgia Meloni’s government has invested heavily in building migrant centers in Albania, pouring tens of millions of euros into the project. However, the court’s decision has cast doubt on the future of such transfers. Meloni, who is currently on an official visit to Lebanon, announced an extraordinary Council of Ministers meeting on Monday to devise a solution. Her party, Fratelli d’Italia, criticized the ruling, accusing the judiciary of political bias but offering no concrete evidence to support this claim.
Meanwhile, the migrants’ asylum claims have already been processed in Albania under an accelerated procedure, with all 12 requests being swiftly rejected—an unusually fast decision-making process compared to Italy, where it typically takes months to reach such outcomes. The rejected migrants now have 14 days to appeal the decision.
The court ruling only addressed the detention issue, not the asylum requests. The rejection was influenced by a recent European Court of Justice ruling on “safe country” designations. The ruling states that for a country to be deemed safe, it must be safe for all individuals across its entire territory, something many countries on Italy’s list fail to meet. This includes Bangladesh and Egypt, the countries of origin of the 12 migrants in question.
