Search ICMPD Publications

The Western Balkans region occupies a uniquely complex position in the European labour migration landscape. These economies simultaneously function as a major source of outward labour migration to the European Union and as an increasingly significant destination for workers arriving from third countries, particularly from Southeast Asia. This dual role generates governance challenges that no single economy within the region can adequately address in isolation.

This report provides the analytical foundation for the Regional Roadmap to improve labour migration management and prevent secondary movements. In-depth research was conducted between October 2025 and February 2026 in all Western Balkan partners, drawing on desk research, administrative data analysis, and key informant interviews with institutional stakeholders.

Approximately one quarter of the Western Balkans' population now lives abroad, reflecting long-standing patterns of outward migration driven by demographic decline, wage differentials, and limited domestic labour market opportunities. At the same time, sustained emigration has created significant labour shortages in sectors essential to economic growth, including construction, agriculture and tourism. To address these shortages, economies across the region have increasingly turned to recruiting workers from third countries.

The rapid growth and diversification of labour migration, particularly from countries such as Nepal, Bangladesh, India, Pakistan, and the Philippines, has introduced new demands on migration governance systems. Administrative procedures, legal frameworks, labour market oversight, and worker protection mechanisms are adapting to a migration reality that has evolved dynamically.

Against this backdrop, the report identifies regional challenges, and opportunities, highlighting areas where strengthened cooperation and more coherent governance can improve labour migration management, enhance the protection of migrant workers, and reduce the risks associated with secondary movements while supporting sustainable labour market development across the Western Balkans.

Authors

The document was authored by Mădălina Lepşa-Rogoz (Senior Researcher, ICMPD), Biljana Lubarovska (External Expert), and Gordana Grujičić (External Expert). The contributing author is Alida Vračić (External Expert). 

Research activities in the Western Balkans were conducted and reported on by Biljana Lubarovska (Albania, Kosovo* and North Macedonia), Nermin Oruč (Bosnia and Herzegovina), and Gordana Grujičić (Serbia and Montenegro). Their expertise, field research, and analytical contributions were essential to the development of this publication. 

The study Skills Mobility Partnerships in the Western Balkans prepared by Laetitia Hohwieler, Caitlin Katsiaficas, and Maegan Hendow also informed aspects of the analysis presented in this report.

_{*All references to Kosovo in this content should be understood to be in the context of United Nations Security Council resolution 1244 (1999).}

Labour migration is no longer a marginal issue in the Western Balkans. It is becoming a structural feature of the region’s labour markets as populations decline and labour shortages deepen. Given that the foreign labour force will increasingly be needed to sustain economic activity and essential services, labour migration governance across the region will have to be adapted.
 

Legal frameworks vary in scope and consistency of application. Procedures may be unclear or administratively demanding, and post-entry follow-up and support for foreign workers are relatively limited. In practice, many foreign workers encounter bureaucratic hurdles, language barriers, and social isolation. These conditions may undermine retention in lawful employment and encourage irregular movement towards the EU.

This roadmap addresses that risk by outlining practical steps to keep legal labour pathways clear, predictable, and protective, and helps institutions detect problems early and respond proportionately. Credible screening, transparent recruitment and clear obligations lead to consistent post-entry follow-up and easier management of legal status. Employers can plan recruitment with more confidence, and workers are less exposed to deception, labour exploitation, precarious situations that may increase vulnerability, or sudden loss of lawful options. When these conditions are unmet, lawful pathways are more likely to break down due to misinformation, weak oversight, or loss of visibility after entry, thereby increasing the risk of irregular onward movement.
 

This roadmap has been developed in the framework of the regional project Preventing Secondary Irregular Migration Movements to the EU: Assessing the Situation and Developing a Roadmap for Improving the Screening of Foreign Workers in the Western Balkans (PSIMM) and aligns with wider EU policy efforts, emphasising practical cooperation, integrity of legal pathways, prevention of irregular movement, effective protection, and improved data interoperability as part of the region's approximation to the EU.

The document was drafted by an external expert, Ms Alida Vračić, in close cooperation with ICMPD internal experts, Madalina Lepsa Rogoz, Ivanka Hainzl and Veronika Bilger. Special thanks go to the experts Biljana Lubarovska, Gordana Grujičić, and Nermin Oruč for their contributions during the regional workshops.

What does it actually look like when someone returns home after years abroad, often with little money, no formal recognition of skills acquired, and a community that may see their return as failure? This paper sets out to answer that question, drawing on fieldwork, a broad range of project documents, assessment, policy papers and the testimonies of returnees across Bangladesh, Iraq and Pakistan.

This publication draws on evolving trafficking trends across the Prague Process region and highlights evidence-based, victim-centred prevention approaches. It outlines practical measures to prevent exploitation, disrupt trafficking, and reduce risks of re-trafficking through long-term protection and reintegration, while promoting cross-sectoral responses integrated into migration, labour, social, and development policies.

A decade on from the first Vienna Migration Conference (VMC), VMC2025 convened policymakers, practitioners, and experts at a moment of significant geopolitical change — and at a turning point for European migration governance, with the EU Pact on Migration and Asylum approaching its implementation deadline. This report distils the discussions across two days and 15 sessions into the key insights shaping the road ahead.

This report analyses the rise of online fake job advertisements in Pakistan and their links to irregular migration, migrant smuggling, and human trafficking. Conducted under the Norwegian-funded FJA-PAK project, it combines desk research and stakeholder consultations to assess the social, political, and legal context, as well as the methods used by criminal networks.

The findings show that most fake job advertisements are designed to defraud prospective migrants rather than directly facilitate smuggling or trafficking. Scammers often request small, repeated payments to avoid suspicion and prolong exploitation. While some cases are connected to more serious crimes like trafficking, these are less frequent and typically involve more complex, transnational coordination.

Digital platforms—especially social media and messaging apps—play a key role in advertising fraudulent jobs, communicating with victims, and handling international payments. However, cash remains widely used for domestic transactions. Criminal networks are generally informal and loosely organised, though trafficking groups tend to be more structured and sophisticated.

Pakistan has recently strengthened its legal and policy frameworks, including reforms targeting smuggling, trafficking, and cybercrime. Despite this progress, challenges persist. In practice, distinguishing between smuggling and trafficking remains difficult, complicating law enforcement efforts. Additionally, broadly classifying all online crime as cybercrime risks overwhelming specialised units, weakening understanding of offline links, and potentially reducing penalties.

To address these issues, the report recommends stronger inter-agency coordination through clear procedures and joint task forces, increased investment in technology and training, and improved trust and collaboration among stakeholders.

In conclusion, while Pakistan has made important strides in promoting safe migration and combating exploitation, gaps in institutional capacity and prevention remain. Addressing these weaknesses is essential to disrupt criminal networks and better protect vulnerable migrants.

Monitoring is essential to ensuring that return procedures uphold Europe’s human rights commitments and remain accountable to public scrutiny. The FAiR Policy Brief examines how fundamental rights monitoring operates within the EU’s return systems and proposes ways to enhance its action.

Under the EU Return Directive, Member States must monitor forced return operations to safeguard migrants’ rights. With the EU Pact on Migration and Asylum and the proposed EU Return Regulation, the scope and role of monitoring are expected to expand significantly — making this an opportune moment to address existing legal and operational gaps.

Key Findings:

• Positive impact of monitoring: Fundamental rights monitoring has improved compliance with human rights standards during forced returns, notably in preventing ill-treatment, protecting vulnerable individuals, and ensuring access to medical care.
   
• Inconsistent implementation across Member States: National monitoring mechanisms vary widely in prerogatives and resources. Some are housed in Ombudsman institutions, others within government bodies or NGOs — leading to uneven access to information, detention sites, and flight monitoring.
   
• Limited scope of current monitoring: Monitoring covers only forced return operations, leaving assisted voluntary return and reintegration (AVR(R)) programmes, pre-departure administrative detention, and external border operations relatively unchecked despite rights risks.
   
• Lack of post-return monitoring: Most national mechanisms do not track migrants’ situation after return, weakening compliance with the non-refoulement principle and depriving authorities of valuable country-of-origin data.

This publication provides a regional perspective to ICMPD’s Migration Outlook 2026, delving into key current and emerging migration trends in the Mediterranean region, with a focus on countries of North Africa and the Middle East. Whilst it does not have the ambition to foretell the future or cover all relevant trends, the Mediterranean Migration Outlook aims to highlight significant scenarios to consider in 2026 based on the analysis of recent data and policy developments.

ICMPD's Pan-Africa Regional Migration Outlook identifies six key trends that are expected to shape migration dynamics and policy discourse across Sub-Saharan Africa in 2026. These trends reflect structural drivers, evolving governance responses and shifting geopolitical contexts that are likely to influence both mobility patterns and the broader narrative surrounding migration in the year ahead.

This publication includes an update of the data following its release to reflect the latest available information.

ICMPD’s Migration Outlook for the Silk Routes region presents a brief analysis of recent regional migration and policy trends and provides an outlook on developments to watch out for in 2026.

The Eastern Europe and Central Asia (EECA) Migration Outlook presents an analysis of the key events and trends that shaped migration in the EECA region in 2025. It also provides a cautious outlook into areas and issues that may affect migration and mobility to, within, and from the region in 2026.

This report examines how migration will shape the region’s demographic and socio-economic future by 2035 under two trajectories: EU Integration, marked by institutional strengthening and circular mobility, and Strategic Isolation, characterised by governance stagnation and one-way outflows.

This publication was produced in the framework of the Prague Process Migration Observatory. The Prague Process is funded by the European Union through the Migration Partnership Facility (MPF), which is implemented by the International Centre for Migration Policy Development (ICMPD).

Rather than an exceptional measure, regularisation is a frequent response to resolve situations of longer term, protracted irregularity. This handbook argues that regularisation should be considered a standard element of the migration policy toolbox, providing a structured route for irregular migrants to regularise their status when other options, such as return, are not feasible. Irregular migration should be understood as a structural feature of contemporary societies, arising from ongoing labour demand, family and social networks, individual migration aspirations, and restrictive entry and residence policies. This handbook provides practical, evidence-based guidance on the design, implementation, and evaluation of regularisation policies, highlighting their impacts on labour markets, social cohesion, and migrant rights. Drawing on experiences from Europe, North America, and other world regions, it examines how different policy approaches operate, how key actors shape outcomes, and how procedural design affects accessibility, inclusivity, and legitimacy. It underscores that regularisation, when carefully implemented, can reduce informality, enhance integration, and strengthen fiscal and social contributions.