Shëngjin, Albania: A navy boat carrying migrants intercepted in Italian waters docked at Shengjin port in Albania Wednesday, AFP journalists saw, the first arrivals under a new deal between Rome and Tirana.
The Italian navy vessel arrived after a 36-hour voyage carrying 16 men from Bangladesh and Egypt.
They will be settled in prefabricated housing while their asylum requests are processed.
Italy’s two processing centers in Albania, surrounded by high walls and security cameras, are at Camp Gjader, 20 kilometers (12 miles) from the port.
They will be operated under Italian law, with Italian security and staff, and judges hearing cases by video from Rome.
If an applicant’s asylum request is refused, cells have been set up on site.
Human rights groups have questioned whether there will be enough protection for asylum seekers. They have expressed doubts, too, as to whether it complies with international law.
But Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni brushed aside criticism in comments on Tuesday.
“It is a new, courageous, unprecedented path, but one that perfectly reflects the European spirit and has everything it takes to be followed also with other non-EU nations,” she said.
The arrangement between the two countries is a European first, which other leaders in the region are watching closely.
The project was agreed in a November 2023 deal between Italy and Albania. Set to last five years, it will cost Italy an estimated 160 million euros a year.
The centers will have a capacity of 1,000 initially growing to 3,000 in the long term.
Its critics say that given such numbers, the scheme cannot be justified.
“Over the last three years, more than 1,600 migrants have landed in Italy,” migration researcher Matteo Villa of Datalab Europe posted on X. “An Italian navy vessels is taking 16 to Albania.
“I don’t think I need to add anything else.”
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Italian navy brings first migrants to Albania centre
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Italian navy brings first migrants to Albania centre
- The Italian navy vessel arrived after a 36-hour voyage carrying 16 men from Bangladesh and Egypt
- Migrants will be settled in prefabricated housing while their asylum requests are processed
Spanish police evict hundreds of migrants from squat deemed a safety hazard
BARCELONA: Police in northeastern Spain began carrying out eviction orders Wednesday to clear an abandoned school building where hundreds of mostly undocumented migrants were living in a squat north of Barcelona.
Knowing that the eviction was coming, most of the occupants had left before police in riot gear from Catalonia’s regional police entered the school’s premises early in the morning under court orders.
The squat was located in Badalona, a working class city that borders Barcelona. Many sub-Saharan migrants, mostly from Senegal and Gambia, had moved into the empty school building since it was left abandoned in 2023.
The mayor of Badalona, Xavier García Albiol, announced the evictions in a post on X. “As I had promised, the eviction of the squat of 400 illegal squatters in the B9 school in Badalona begins,” he wrote.
Lawyer Marta Llonch, who represents the squatters, said that many of them lived from selling scrap metal collected from the streets, while a few others have residency and work permits but were forced to live there because they couldn’t afford housing.
“Many people are going to sleep on the street tonight,” Llonch told The Associated Press. “Just because you evict these people it doesn’t mean they disappear. If you don’t give them an alternative place to live they will now be on the street, which will be a problem for them and the city.”
García Albiol, of the conservative Popular Party, has built his political career as Badalona’s long-standing mayor with an anti-immigration stance.
The Badalona town hall had argued that the squat was a public safety hazard. In 2020, an old factory occupied by around a hundred migrants in Badalona caught fire and four people were killed in the blaze.
Like other southern European countries, Spain has for more than a decade seen a steady influx of migrants who risked their lives crossing the Mediterranean or Atlantic in small boats.
While many developed countries have taken a hard-line position against migration, Spain’s left-wing government has said that legal migration has helped its economy grow.
Knowing that the eviction was coming, most of the occupants had left before police in riot gear from Catalonia’s regional police entered the school’s premises early in the morning under court orders.
The squat was located in Badalona, a working class city that borders Barcelona. Many sub-Saharan migrants, mostly from Senegal and Gambia, had moved into the empty school building since it was left abandoned in 2023.
The mayor of Badalona, Xavier García Albiol, announced the evictions in a post on X. “As I had promised, the eviction of the squat of 400 illegal squatters in the B9 school in Badalona begins,” he wrote.
Lawyer Marta Llonch, who represents the squatters, said that many of them lived from selling scrap metal collected from the streets, while a few others have residency and work permits but were forced to live there because they couldn’t afford housing.
“Many people are going to sleep on the street tonight,” Llonch told The Associated Press. “Just because you evict these people it doesn’t mean they disappear. If you don’t give them an alternative place to live they will now be on the street, which will be a problem for them and the city.”
García Albiol, of the conservative Popular Party, has built his political career as Badalona’s long-standing mayor with an anti-immigration stance.
The Badalona town hall had argued that the squat was a public safety hazard. In 2020, an old factory occupied by around a hundred migrants in Badalona caught fire and four people were killed in the blaze.
Like other southern European countries, Spain has for more than a decade seen a steady influx of migrants who risked their lives crossing the Mediterranean or Atlantic in small boats.
While many developed countries have taken a hard-line position against migration, Spain’s left-wing government has said that legal migration has helped its economy grow.
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