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What happens when the expulsion of migrants becomes the subject of international negotiations? This episode explores the emergence of a system in which States enter into agreements with third countries to accommodate non-nationals.
The expulsion of an alien has for a long time been based on a relatively simple logic: when a State legally decided on his removal, the person was in principle returned to his country of origin. But a new international migration architecture complicates this pattern.
The United States has developed agreements to transfer certain foreign nationals to third countries of which they are not citizens. According to the international survey coordinated by Forbidden Stories, more than 25,000 people had been transferred to third countries between January 2025 and 31 August 2026.
Behind these transfers is a real diplomacy of expulsion. Migration policies are no longer confined to borders: they become a subject of negotiation between governments, mobilizing international aid, diplomatic cooperation, financing and geopolitical power relations.
This trend is gradually changing the distance of migrants to service which can be compensated. Some States agree to host persons outside their territory in exchange for funding or in broader diplomatic relations.
A fundamental question then arises: can we talk about the emergence of a real international market for migration outsourcing? When a country directly or indirectly finances another State to take care of persons it wishes to move away, the border itself becomes in some way exportable.
For African countries, the issue is particularly sensitive. It confronts countries with very different financial and diplomatic capacities and raises the question of the real bargaining power of the countries requested to host third-country nationals.
The phenomenon also raises important legal issues. What status does a person have in a country of which he is not a national? What guarantees surround his stay, possible detention, asylum application or subsequent return? And which State remains responsible for protecting its fundamental rights?
Beyond the American case, this logic reveals a more general transformation of migration governance. The richest States are increasingly seeking to move from their territories certain functions formerly exercised at their own borders: control, processing requests, detention, removal or reception.
Migration thus becomes a new geopolitical transaction space where sovereignty, diplomacy, financing, security and human rights intersect.
This episode analyses this emerging economy of remigration and raises a central question: how far can a state outsource its migration policy and transfer to another country the care of people it no longer wishes to maintain in its territory?
