AMSTERDAM (Reuters) -The conservative Dutch government is looking into sending rejected African asylum seekers to Uganda, Prime Minister Dick Schoof said on Thursday, while acknowledging it might not be feasible.
“It is a serious plan, but a lot still needs to be worked out,” he told reporters in Brussels.
It was not clear whether such a plan would be legal under Dutch law, or whether Uganda would be amenable to it.
The Dutch trade and development minister first tabled the idea during a visit to the East African country on Wednesday.
“I don’t think Uganda would agree to that,” Okello Oryem, Uganda’s State Minister for Foreign Affairs, told Reuters by phone on Thursday, noting that his country already shelters 1.6 million refugees from Sudan, South Sudan and Democratic Republic of Congo.
“We don’t deport any refugees. Why do European countries deport refugees?”
The Dutch plan follows a European trend to create “return hubs” outside the EU, housing rejected asylum seekers before returning them to their home countries.
Reducing immigration and asylum requests are top priorities for Dutch voters and Schoof’s government. Around 50,000 people seeking asylum entered the Netherlands in 2023.
“We need to see collectively how we can limit the flow of asylum seekers and stimulate returns,” Schoof said.
“It will be a process of trial and error, but it’s important that we look what we can do.”
(Reporting by Elias Biryabarema, Bart Meijer, Charlotte Van Campenhout. Writing by Toby Sterling.Editing by Bernadette Baum and Franklin Paul)
