Three EU Countries 'to Send 7500 Refugees Back to Bulgaria'

Germany, Austria and Hungary would like to return about 7500 people with a refugee status to Bulgaria, media reports suggest.

Officials from the three EU member states have already referred to the Interior Ministry in Sofia to inform in about the migrants, Bulgarian daily Pressa wrote on Sunday.

As many as 180 of them were extradited in 2014, but others are also likely to be returned.

Last summer, Germany told Bulgaria it would send back some 3000 people with either humanitarian or refugee status who had illegally reached its territory. Berlin later renounced the idea.

In theory, the refugee status, unlike the humanitarian status, allows its bearer to travel in the rest of the EU.

But current rules state that a refugee who has been registered in Bulgaria but chooses to move to another EU country is to be sent back.

Under the Dublin Regulation, it is up to the EU member state which has served as an asylum seeker's entry into the EU to protect the seeker and look into their asylum claim.

...