Five EU states push 'return hubs' for 2027 as Italy weighs role

Five European Union countries are seeking a deal with an unnamed non-EU country to host a 'return hub' for migrants whose asylum applications have been rejected, with a targeted start date of January 1, a Danish minister said Friday, according to The Local Italy.

The proposal, which would centralise deportations of rejected applicants in a third country, lands at a moment when Italy's role as the EU's primary Mediterranean arrival point keeps migration near the top of the bloc's agenda. The Danish minister's comments came as EU interior ministers discussed migration policy in Brussels.

From the Ligurian waterfront, the plan reads as another attempt to shift the migrant processing burden beyond Europe's borders — a concept that has circulated in various forms for years but has yet to produce a functioning model anywhere.