Original Source
EU Moves to Establish Overseas 'Return Hubs' for Migrants
EU Approves Talks on Overseas 'Return Hubs'
European Union (EU) lawmakers have endorsed the opening of talks with the EU Council on a new controversial legal framework to establish block-wide mechanisms to expel illegal migrants. This includes creating so-called 'return hubs' located in third countries. The idea is to hold migrants deemed to have no right to stay within the bloc in de facto detention facilities outside the EU's borders. This proposed 'Return Regulation' is still in its early stages of the legislative process and aims to send people marked for deportation in the EU to these overseas 'return hubs' rather than keeping them within the bloc while awaiting expulsion.
Human Rights Groups Condemn 'Legal Black Holes'
The scheme has met strong opposition from human rights groups and pro-migration political forces. Critics argue that the plan is intended to make irregular migrants and failed asylum seekers disappear into a 'legal black hole.' In Thursday's plenary vote, 389 MEPs voted in favor of proceeding to the next stage of the legislative process, with 206 voting against and 32 abstaining. Eve Geddie, Amnesty International’s European institutions director, stated that the proposed reform had not received "adequate scrutiny or meaningful human rights assessments," warning that it represents a "growing trend towards increasingly harmful, exclusionary, and draconian policies on migration."
*Source: RT News (2026-03-27)*
