France wanted to send this Moroccan man back to the Netherlands: the courts cancel everything

The Moroccan national, born in 1993, had applied for asylum in Bas-Rhin on 27 April 2026. On 2 June, the prefect decided to transfer him to the Netherlands, then placed him under house arrest on 23 July. Both decisions were notified to him on 7 August.

But his previous journey would bring down the entire procedure. According to the decision of the Strasbourg administrative court, the Moroccan man stated that he had arrived in France in 2018 after previously submitting asylum applications in the Netherlands and Germany.

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Above all, France had issued him a one-year temporary residence permit on 12 March 2020 for health reasons. This was a decisive factor under the European Dublin Regulation.

France had become responsible for his case

When a European state issues a residence permit to an applicant, responsibility for handling the applicant’s case is transferred to that state. For the court, the issuance of the French permit in 2020 had therefore made France responsible for the Moroccan man’s situation.

The Bas-Rhin prefecture could therefore not ask the Netherlands to take responsibility for him again. The judge held that the French authorities had wrongly applied the Dublin procedure and annulled the transfer.

The 45-day house arrest, which was directly linked to this transfer, was also annulled. As in other cases where a removal decision was challenged by the courts, this annulment does not, however, mean that the Moroccan man automatically obtains a new residence permit.

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The prefect of Bas-Rhin will have to review his situation within one month. The state will also have to pay his lawyer 1,200 euros before tax, subject to the conditions relating to legal aid.