Sweden prepares to deport 80,000 asylum seekers in policy reversal

Sweden’s migration agency has been put on alert to deport up to 80,000 asylum seekers this year, a month after Stockholm reversed its open-door policy and introduced ID checks on its borders.

Parallel to the deportation plan, equivalent to half the number of new asylum applications filed last year, Sweden will double the number of border police and carry out more checks within the country.

Swedish officials dismissed claims the country was getting tough on migrants, insisting deportations would rise in line with the surge in asylum applications last year to 163,000. That is the highest per capita rate in Europe, while asylum applications rejections in Sweden runs at about 45 per cent.

"We have a big challenge before us," said Anders Ygeman, the Social Democrat home affairs minister, to Swedish radio. "The first step will be to go with voluntary return, and to create the best conditions for that, but if that doesn't work, we will need returns backed up by force."

Sweden has a population of almost 10 million and has found itself at the heart of Europe’s migrant crisis, as millions fleeing war and poverty in the Middle East and north Africa have moved north to wealthier European Union member states.

But Stockholm’s decision to close its borders in January has had a knock-on effect through Denmark, Germany and Austria down into the countries along the so-called Balkan Route.

Swedish officials said yesterday that they are ready to charter planes with Germany as the most cost-effective way to implement the deportation plan. Germany took in 1.1 million people last year but, like Sweden, is facing growing pressure to step up the rate of deportations, which ran at 20,000 last year.

Like Germany, Mr Ygeman admitted a difficulty in reaching agreement with asylum seekers’ home countries.

“I have had a discussion with the North African countries and we have had a discussion with Afghanistan,” he said, “and it’s a difficult task to get these countries to take responsibility for their citizens.”

In addition, the Swedish government sees “a significant risk” that large numbers of rejected asylum seekers will attempt to stay without papers and disappear. With that in mind, Mr Ygeman warned of “severe consequences” yesterday for companies who hire rejected asylum seekers.

Patrik Engström, head of the Sweden’s border police, said a closer co-operation with migration authorities would be required, to ensure that rejected asylum applications result in deportation.

“It’s reach the point where people are passed over from the agency to the police, where many disappear,” he said. “By the time they hear the decision on their claim, police personnel need to already be in place.”

Of the 13,000 people sent back from Sweden last year, some 10,000 went voluntarily while 3,000 were forcibly deported.

Sweden’s migration agency has warned that stepping up deportations would be an “enormous feat”, given a backlog of up to two years before asylum applications are assessed.