Albania approves contested deal to hold asylum seekers for Italy
Al Jazeera
Rights groups criticise agreement that could see up to 36,000 people a year held in Italian-run asylum-processing centres.
Albania’s Parliament has approved a deal signed with Italy that will see authorities hold thousands of asylum seekers rescued in international waters while their applications are processed, drawing criticism from human rights groups.
Under the agreement, Albania would hold up to 3,000 migrants and refugees at any one time in two Italian-run processing centres located near the Albanian port of Shengjin for periods of about a month. It is expected that up to 36,000 people a year could be sent to the country.
The agreement has been denounced by rights groups with the International Rescue Committee describing it as “dehumanising“. Amnesty International condemned it as “illegal and unworkable“.
The deal, approved by Albania’s Constitutional Court last month, was backed by 77 lawmakers in the 140-seat parliament, dominated by Prime Minister Edi Rama‘s Socialist Party.
Conservative opposition MPs boycotted the vote, lambasting the government over a lack of transparency and saying the deal was an “irresponsible and dangerous act for national security”.
