In another sign that European countries are increasingly cracking down on undocumented migrants, Greece’s Parliament passed a law early Wednesday imposing prison terms for those who remain in the country after they are rejected for asylum.
The law, which was pushed by Greece’s conservative prime minister, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, introduces some of the toughest penalties in Europe for failed asylum seekers. Undocumented migrants who are denied asylum and do not leave the country within 14 days will be subject to prison terms of two to five years, steep fines and swifter deportations.
Greece’s move comes amid a broader effort across Europe to close off borders to migrants by turning them away at points of entry, making it easier to deport them and rolling back protections if they stay.
Over the summer, Mr. Mitsotakis said he wanted to toughen penalties for rejected asylum seekers following a spike in arrivals to Crete from Libya. More than 2,000 migrants landed on the island in the first week of July, with arrivals for the first half of the year three times higher than in the same period in 2024.
On July 9, Mr. Mitsotakis suspended asylum applications for three months, saying he was sending a message to human smugglers that “the passage to Greece is closed.”
As the bill passed in Parliament in the early hours of Wednesday morning in Athens, Thanos Plevris, the migration minister, gave closing remarks addressed to migrants who might fall afoul of the new law. “The Greek state does not accept you,” he said. “You only have one choice: to go back. You’re not welcome.”
As other sea routes became more difficult because of stricter border controls or coast guard monitoring, Crete became increasingly popular with smugglers, according to Frontex, the European Union’s border agency. Since the suspension of asylum in Greece, arrivals to the island have swiftly declined, with fewer than 500 in the first 27 days of August. Still, lawmakers who supported the new law said that stricter measures were needed.
“There are those who are downtrodden, and then there are some who are spoiled, who think that Europe owes them,” Mr. Plevris, the migration minister, said during parliamentary debate on Tuesday. He said, “We need to put emphasis on the voluntary returns, but there will be consequences for those who do not choose to return to their countries.”
Genuine refugees, Mr. Plevris said, will still be granted asylum.
Before the new law, asylum applicants in Greece could be detained for up to 18 months. Now, migrants who arrive without legal immigration paperwork can be detained for up to 24 months.
If they apply for asylum and are rejected, they will have a right of appeal, but if an asylum application is rejected, the migrant must leave or face up to five years in prison and fines. Financial penalties will be tripled to 10,000 euros, about $11,700, for illegal entry and up to €30,000 if they re-enter after a rejected asylum application.
Until now, migrants whose asylum applications were rejected had 25 days to leave Greece voluntarily. The new law shortens that to 14 days and permits the government to use electronic ankle monitors during this period.
The measure also abolishes the right of undocumented migrants to apply for residence after seven years. Earlier this month, Mr. Plevris told state radio that migrants who left voluntarily would receive a €2,000 “bonus.”
The government has said the law is intended chiefly as a deterrent. During the parliamentary debate, Mr. Plevris said migrants “should know they fooled you when they were telling you Greece would be friendly” to those who are rejected for asylum.
“If they know that they will be detained and monitored, and that their stay will never become legalized,” he said, fewer people will set out for Greece.
Greece has already taken a harsh stance toward migrants. In 2023, a New York Times investigation showed that the Greek Coast Guard had rounded up asylum seekers and taken them back out to sea.
Mr. Plevris said Greece would be the first European country to impose the kinds of criminal penalties on rejected asylum seekers that are in the new law. Some other countries, including Germany, can send those who live in the country without valid paperwork to prison for up to a year or impose a fine.
As in the United States, illegal immigration has become one of the hottest-button political issues in Europe. although overall, the absolute numbers of undocumented migrants arriving there have declined significantly.
In Greece, for example, the total number of migrants arriving by sea in the first eight months of 2025 was below 25,000 people, slightly lower than in those months the previous year, according to data from the International Organization for Migration at the United Nations. In the peak year, 2015, more than 850,000 arrived.
“The trend seems to be to carry out stricter policies toward refugees and migrants arriving by sea,” said Flavio Di Giacomo, a spokesman for the Mediterranean office of the U.N. migration agency. “But as a matter of fact, we do not see any kind of emergency in terms of numbers of people trying to enter in Europe.”
Critics of Greece’s new law say it may be difficult to enforce given that the country’s prisons are already overcrowded. Some say that Greece is using criminal law to extend the detention of migrants beyond what is allowed under European law.
There is no official data on how many migrants overstay after rejection. Official data shows that more than a quarter of asylum applications to Greece were rejected during the first seven months of the year.
Iliana Magra contributed reporting from Athens, and Jim Tankersley and Christopher F. Schuetze from Berlin.
Motoko Rich is the incoming New York Times bureau chief in Rome, where she will also cover the Vatican.
Niki Kitsantonis is a freelance correspondent for The Times based in Athens. She has been writing about Greece for 20 years, including more than a decade of coverage for The Times.
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