Switzerland and Kosovo have signed a readmission agreement, enabling Switzerland to return Kosovars who are in the country illegally to their homeland.
Swiss Justice Minister Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf said the accord provided the legal framework for an already existing practice.
Widmer-Schlumpf signed the deal with the Kosovo interior minister, Zenum Pajaziti, during his visit to Bern on Wednesday.
She said cooperation with Kosovo was important since it is a transit country for organised crime. Pajaziti said his government would increase efforts to fight drugs and human trafficking.
Switzerland has the largest expatriate community of Kosovars after Germany, with 170,000 living in the alpine nation.
The new agreement, according to Widmer-Schlumpf, would only affect a couple of dozen people.
However, human rights organisations including Amnesty International warned the Swiss government against using the accord to send back members of ethnic minorities.
Roma people among other minorities still face discrimination in Kosovo, they said.
All rights reserved. The content of the website by swissinfo.ch is copyrighted. It is intended for private use only. Any other use of the website content beyond the use stipulated above, particularly the distribution, modification, transmission, storage and copying requires prior written consent of swissinfo.ch. Should you be interested in any such use of the website content, please contact us via contact@swissinfo.ch.
As regards the use for private purposes, it is only permitted to use a hyperlink to specific content, and to place it on your own website or a website of third parties. The swissinfo.ch website content may only be embedded in an ad-free environment without any modifications. Specifically applying to all software, folders, data and their content provided for download by the swissinfo.ch website, a basic, non-exclusive and non-transferable license is granted that is restricted to the one-time downloading and saving of said data on private devices. All other rights remain the property of swissinfo.ch. In particular, any sale or commercial use of these data is prohibited.
