Dozens of migrants left Albania in Italian custody on Saturday, after a ruling by judges in Rome struck a fresh blow to Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni's embattled third-country migration centres.
According to an AFP reporter, an Italian boat carrying 43 migrants departed from the Albanian port of Shengjin just after midday Saturday.
The migrants arrived in Albania on Tuesday, following an earlier months-long pause in the scheme. Several were sent back the same day, while dozens remained.
On Friday, Rome's Court of Appeals referred the case to the European Court of Justice (ECJ), meaning the 43 migrants in Albania had to be transferred to Italy, a government source told AFP.
Meloni's plan to outsource migrant processing to a non-EU country and speed up repatriations of failed asylum seekers is being followed closely by other European nations.
The plan, heavily criticised by rights groups and opposition parties in Italy, has run into repeated blocks and the ECJ is examining legal questions raised by several Italian courts.
The migrants sent to Albania were among a group intercepted by Italian authorities as they tried to cross the Mediterranean.
Most hailed from Bangladesh, while there were also six Egyptians, one man from Ivory Coast and one from Gambia, said rights associations.
Meloni signed a deal with Albanian counterpart Edi Rama in November 2023 to open two Italian-run centres in Albania.
The centres became operational in October, but after judges ruled against the detentions of the first two groups of men transferred there, they were instead sent to Italy.
Italy, like many other countries, has a list of so-called safe countries from which asylum seekers can have their applications fast-tracked.
The judges who blocked the first transfer of migrants cited an ECJ ruling stipulating that European Union states can only designate entire countries as safe, not parts of countries.
Italy's list included some countries with unsafe areas.
In response, Meloni's government passed a law cutting its safe list to 19 countries from 22 -- and insisting all parts of those nations were safe.
But judges ruled against a second transfer of migrants -- seven men from Egypt and Bangladesh -- saying they wanted clarification from the ECJ.
An ECJ hearing has been provisionally set for February, according to Italian media.