EU’s five-country group moves to deport rejected migrants Uzbekistan among possible destinations

Greece is leading a five-country EU push to establish a system for sending migrants who have been denied the right to remain in the bloc to countries such as Rwanda as early as next year.

Greece’s Migration Minister Thanos Plevris told POLITICO in an interview that the so-called Core Group — comprising Denmark, Austria, Greece, Germany and the Netherlands — plans to launch a pilot scheme by the first half of 2027 for transferring rejected asylum-seekers to designated countries outside the EU.

The initiative is expected to become fully operational during the second half of 2027, Plevris said, coinciding with Greece’s assumption of the rotating presidency of the Council of the EU in July.

Two EU diplomats familiar with the discussions, who were granted anonymity to speak freely about the matter, said Rwanda is expected to be the destination of the first agreement. Uganda and Uzbekistan are also being considered as potential countries for receiving migrants who are returned from the bloc.

Plevris noted that the countries being considered already host significant migrant populations and have facilities capable of accommodating additional arrivals. The Core Group nations, he said, “are open to whatever framework the countries there want — whether they want to talk about camps, or broader integration programs.”

Rwanda has previously featured prominently in proposals aimed at processing migrants outside Europe. In 2022, the UK unveiled a controversial multimillion-pound agreement with Kigali under which asylum-seekers would have been deported to Rwanda while their claims were processed there. The arrangement was ultimately scrapped following years of legal challenges.

Funding for the new initiative could prove another politically sensitive issue, particularly given its potential impact on voters, and would have to be provided by the Core Group countries. “We want to have a financially realistic project,” Plevris said, while noting that the participating governments ultimately want the European Commission to take an active role in the process.

By Jeyhun Aghazada