Outsourcing Borders, Blurring Responsibility: Return Hubs and Third-Country Deals Risk Migrant Rights

A new report presented to the UN Human Rights Council warns that governments are increasingly shifting migration responsibilities beyond their borders through third-country deals, offshore processing arrangements and return mechanisms. The report argues that these policies may expose migrants and asylum seekers to detention, abuse, family separation, data misuse and the risk of being sent back to places where they face serious harm.

For many migrants and asylum seekers, the journey no longer ends at a border. It can continue into a legal maze of third-country transfers, offshore processing, return hubs and unclear accountability.

A new report warns that this growing practice may be placing migrants and asylum seekers at greater risk of detention, abuse, forced return and legal limbo. The issue is known as migration externalisation, which practically means shifting parts of border control, asylum processing or migrant removals to other countries. These arrangements can include efforts to stop people before they reach a destination country, agreements to process asylum claims elsewhere, or systems that allow people to be removed to third countries, including places where they may have no previous connection.

For governments under pressure to control arrivals, such policies may appear to offer a practical solution. For migrants and asylum seekers, however, they can create a dangerous gap between political responsibility and human rights protection.

The Border Is Moving: Accountability Isn't Keeping Up

Migration policy is no longer confined to airports, ports, fences or official crossing points. The border begins far earlier, through cooperation deals, surveillance systems, third-country arrangements and removal agreements that operate beyond the territory of the state trying to control migration.

The report presented to the Human Rights Council by Gehad Madi, the UN Special Rapporteur on the human rights of migrants, argues that governments are relying more heavily on external arrangements despite longstanding concerns over their compatibility with international human rights obligations. The concern is not that states lack the right to manage migration, but whether they can move key parts of migration control abroad while still ensuring that people are protected from abuse, unlawful detention, forced labour, family separation or return to danger.

When migration control is transferred to another country, accountability can become harder to trace. A destination country may say another state is responsible for processing or removal. A third country may say it is acting under an agreement. The migrant caught between them may have limited access to courts, lawyers, complaint systems or independent monitors. This may result in a system in which the legal duty to protect rights remains on paper, while practical responsibility becomes blurred.

'Safe' Transfers, Real Risks

One of the report's main concerns is the growing use of "safe third country" policies and "return hubs." These mechanisms can allow migrants or asylum seekers to be transferred to another state while their status is assessed or after removal decisions are made.

Such policies raise difficult legal and humanitarian questions. If a person is sent to a country where they have no meaningful connection, what guarantees exist that their claim will be fairly assessed? Who ensures they are not detained arbitrarily or denied access to justice? What happens if that country then sends them somewhere else?

The most serious risk identified is chain refoulement, which occurs when a person is transferred from one country to another and may eventually be returned to a place where they face persecution, violence or serious harm. The principle of non-refoulement, which prohibits returning people to places where their life or freedom may be threatened, is a cornerstone of international refugee and human rights law.

Externalisation can make that principle harder to enforce. Once a person is moved through multiple jurisdictions, it may become more difficult to determine who is responsible for preventing harm. It may also become harder for affected individuals to challenge decisions before they are transferred again.

Surveillance Expands, Oversight Shrinks

The report also highlights another growing feature of externalised migration management: surveillance technology. Biometric databases, digital tracking tools and border-monitoring systems are becoming more common in migration cooperation arrangements. These technologies may be used to identify people, monitor movement or support enforcement. However, without strong safeguards, they can also increase risks for those already in vulnerable situations.

The concerns include privacy violations, discrimination and misuse of personal data. For migrants and asylum seekers, the stakes are especially high. Personal information collected in one system may affect access to protection, movement, detention decisions or removal processes. If oversight is weak, errors or misuse can have serious consequences.

Technology can also make migration systems less visible to the public. Decisions may be shaped by data-sharing arrangements, automated tools or cross-border monitoring mechanisms that are difficult for affected individuals to understand or challenge, raising a wider accountability problem. Migration externalisation already makes responsibility harder to locate. When digital surveillance is added to the system, the distance between the person affected and the authority making decisions can grow even wider.

For vulnerable groups, the risks are even sharper. Children, women and girls, people of diverse sexual orientations and gender identities, and individuals facing multiple forms of discrimination may be more exposed to harm when safeguards are weak. Removal to a third country, detention in poorly monitored settings or loss of access to legal support can deepen existing vulnerabilities.

The Real Question: Do Rights Travel With Migrants?

The expansion of migration externalisation reflects a broader political reality: many governments want to reduce arrivals, manage asylum systems under pressure and respond to public concern about irregular migration. However, shifting responsibility abroad cannot become a way to weaken rights protections.

A rights-based system would require transparency over agreements, clear lines of responsibility, independent monitoring, accessible complaint mechanisms and regular human rights impact assessments. These safeguards are not procedural details, but the difference between a system that can be scrutinised and one in which harm is hidden across borders.

The lack of transparency around many migration cooperation agreements remains a major concern. If the public, courts, civil society and affected individuals cannot see how arrangements work, it becomes difficult to assess whether governments are meeting their obligations under international law.

What happens next will depend on whether states treat the UN report as a legal warning or as another contested intervention in a politically sensitive debate. Key issues to watch include whether governments disclose more details about third-country arrangements, whether courts scrutinise return hubs and safe third country policies, and whether independent monitors gain access to places where migrants are transferred, detained or processed.