Area ban for nuisance-causing asylum seeker
Asylum seekers who cause nuisance can be placed in a strict, austere and freedom-restricting regime in Ter Apel from 1 June. This is what Minister Faber (Asylum and Migration) has written in a letter to the House of Representatives.
On 7 February of this year, the pilot for the process availability approach with a reporting obligation and enhanced supervision was already launched at the request of the minister. This approach is for asylum seekers whose asylum applications are considered unlikely to succeed and who are fast-tracked through the procedure. This is now being supplemented with the possibility of further restrictions on the freedom of movement of nuisance offenders in a process availability location (PBL).
In the PBL, asylum seekers will be required to stay in a limited area in and around the asylum seekers’ centre 24 hours a day and will not be allowed to travel to the residential and village centres of Ter Apel and Nieuw Weerdinge. A violation of the tightened rules can lead to detention.
The reopening of the revamped process availability location is a breakthrough since the court ruled in March last year that placement in this regime was unlawful. As a result, placement at a PBL had to be discontinued.
The revamped approach offers possibilities to impose various forms of freedom-restricting measures if an individual has caused nuisance. The legal rationale is that the measure to be imposed within the escalation model is always determined and justified on a case by case basis. Increasingly severe measures can be imposed in this context if the asylum seeker continues to display nuisance behaviour. Steps can also be skipped and, for example, detention can be imposed immediately.
Minister Faber:
“I find it unpalatable that asylum seekers coming to our country seeking safety are intimidating residents and causing unsafe situations. Root and branch eradication of this behaviour is imperative. These individuals causing nuisance deserve the harshest approach possible. I will not tolerate any nuisance. Not now. Not ever.”
Business owners who have suffered loss as the result of nuisance behaviour by asylum seekers deserve assistance and support. It must therefore become easier to recover loss and it is being investigated whether a special municipal counter at the Westerwolde municipality can provide support in this regard.
Originally published at https://www.government.nl/latest/news/2025/04/23/area-ban-for-nuisance-causing-asylum-seeker
