Sweden’s interior minister said that his country is preparing to expel 80,000 asylum seekers over the course of the next year, according to media reports.
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But because of the large number being rejected they would use specially chartered aircraft to take them out of the country, Mr Ygeman said.
– The European Union has urged its member countries to quickly send back those who don’t qualify for asylum so that Europe’s welcome can be focused on those who do, such as people fleeing war in Syria.
Last Thursday, Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Löfven said that Europe could easily take in millions of refugees every year if neighboring countries were willing to work to accept as many refugees as Sweden had.
However, the level of new arrivals has plunged since the beginning of January, when Sweden introduced systematic photo ID border checks, after stating that it has hit its limit in terms of receiving asylum seekers.
Some migrants will also be blocked from bringing their families to join them in Germany for two years, Gabriel said.
Immigration lawyer Terfa Nisébini criticised Ygeman’s plan, saying that by giving an estimate that roughly half of applications would be rejected, telling Expressen newspaper that it risked influencing the way the Swedish Migration Agency assesses cases.
Both countries have tightened asylum rules to stem the flow and force other countries to share the burden.
But rights group Amnesty International blasted the plan, saying it was “fundamentally flawed since it would hinge on illegally returning asylum seekers and refugees”.
“We have a big challenge before us”, said Anders Ygeman, the Social Democrat home affairs minister, to Swedish radio.
Greece’s coast guard says at least 11 people, majority children, have died in the latest migrant boat sinking off an eastern Greek island. About 60,000 did so voluntarily, while 26,000 were deported with coercion and 40,000 absconded.
In 2015, 35,400 of the migrants entering Sweden were unaccompanied minors seeking asylum, five times the number of 2014. Critics of the legislation have compared the new law to the Nazis’ confiscation of gold and other valuables from Jews during the Holocaust.
His announcement comes just days after Ygeman told reporters that 45 percent of the 163,000 applications were rejected.
The comments come as refugees are still heading toward Europe in large numbers, with fatalities commonplace on the perilous journey.
Officials have also called for greater security and resources to assess the trauma level of individuals who have experienced conflicts in their home countries after a young migrant stabbed and killed an employee inside a refugee center on Tuesday.
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The increasingly radical solutions being proposed to the crisis follow a rise in hostility towards migrants following events such as the Cologne sex attacks and the stabbing to death in Sweden of a 22-year-old aid worker, Alexandra Mezher.
