TIRANA, June 8 – The Interior Ministry reported that 48 Albanian citizens have been deported back home from France, Belgium and Finland where they had violated the visit length rules and had also asked for asylum and had failed to obtain it.
Albanian authorities reported their call for the respect of the Schengen rules in the European Union member countries and also not to abuse with the asylum requests there.
Albania has had a visa-free regime with much of the EU since 2010. Albanians are free to go and stay up to 180 days per six months in the Schengen Area countries, which includes non-EU members Switzerland and Norway. But that also means they cannot ask for political asylum there.
Following the strengthening of the rules there hundreds of Albanians who have broken such rules have been turned back. They cannot travel back there in the next five years.
More Albanian deportees return home after breaking visa terms
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