The Italian-run migrant detention centre in Gjader, Albania. Photo: EPA/MALTON DIBRA
An NGO is demanding a investigation into the financing of the Italian government’s controversial setting up of migrant detention centres in Albania.
ActionAid Italy, which tackles poverty and injustice, has submitted a 60-page complaint to the Court of Auditors and asked the Regional Prosecutor’s Office of Lazio to consider opening an investigation into the costs of the scheme to public finances in Italy.
It has sent a separate report to the National Anti-Corruption Authority requesting an investigation into the “unjustifiable misuse of public resources” in its detention centre project, flagging suspected irregularities in awarding the management contract for the centres in Shengjin and Gjader in Albania, valued at 133 million euros.
In its Court of Auditors complaint filed on Tuesday, ActionAid Italy alleges that “public funds were diverted from healthcare, justice, welfare and services, as well as from emergency management funds” to sustain a migrant scheme it described as “inhumane, ineffective and incompatible with the law”.
The centres were initially conceived as structures for reviewing asylum applications to the Italian authorities ‘offshore’ in Albania, under a deal between Italian and Albanian premiers Georgia Meloni and Edi Rama.
The offshoring scheme was closely monitored by other European countries seeking to deter migrants from arriving, but ran into trouble amid a series of legal challenges over human rights.
The buildings now operate as repatriation centres for individuals who have been given expulsion orders from Italian territory. They remain partially underused, however, and there have been reports of self-harm and suicide attempts among detainees transferred there.
The overspending claims were also highlighted in a recent BIRN investigation, which noted that the funds for constructing the centres in Shengjin and Gjader almost doubled from 39.2 million euros to over 74 million, while the average cost per bed in Albania reached around 72,000 euros. The investigation also found that the entire procedure was conducted through direct negotiation and without competition.
In addition to the disputed 133 million euro management contract and construction costs, ActionAid Italy said transporting people to Albania with the Italian ship Libra cost 2.6 million euros, including costs for maintenance and supply of the ship, which was later donated to Albania.
According to data gathered by ActionAid freedom of information requests, the Italian Interior Ministry spent 630,000 euros on transfers and on the purchase of monitoring technologies, while more was spent on food and accommodation for the police forces involved in the migrant transfer operations.