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Croatia has deported 36 Egyptian nationals on a charter flight from Zagreb to Cairo. The Croatian authorities said they are seeking to speed up and reduce the cost of returning migrants staying in the country illegally.

Croatia deported 36 Egyptian nationals on a charter flight from Zagreb to Cairo on Wednesday, November 4, including people prosecuted for migrant smuggling, the interior ministry said.

The deportees were found to be in Croatia illegally. The operation was carried out under escort by Croatian police and Frontex officers, with an Arabic translator accompanying the group.

The charter flight was operated by Croatia's national airline and cost 77,350 euros, funded by the EU's Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund (AMIF).

File photo: Croatia’s Police Directorate plans to organize more charter flights when needed, particularly to return larger groups of foreign nationals of the same nationality | Photo: Stipe Majic / Anadolou / picture alliance

What are the costs of returns?

According to the Croatian interior ministry, the charter flight was arranged because it was considered more cost-effective and would allow the deportations to be carried out as quickly as possible.

"In cases of individual forced removals on regular commercial flights, security requirements often mean that two to three police officers must escort each foreign national. In this particular case, the cost of deportations would have amounted to about 144,000 euros," the statement said.

"This approach allows for faster implementation of forced removals and more efficient use of financial resources and police capacity," it added.

More such flights in the future

Croatia’s Police Directorate plans to organize more charter flights when needed, particularly to return larger groups of foreign nationals of the same nationality.

"This will be considered when a charter flight is deemed more financially advantageous and operationally efficient than individual departures on commercial flights," the statement said.

The ministry said all returns would be carried out in line with legal requirements and security standards.

This year, the Republic of Croatia returned 6,885 persons from the Republic of Croatia within the procedures for the return and transfer of migrants to other countries, while it accepted 1,005 under the Dublin procedure.

What does it cost in other EU countries?

EU-wide data on the cost of forced deportations are not available. It also depends how many people are being deported, from which country and to which country.

In a June 2025 parliamentary response, the European Commission said it did not collect aggregate data on the costs incurred by member states. It cited a 2018 European Parliamentary Research Service estimate putting the average cost of a forced return at 3,414 euros per person, compared to an average cost of 560 euros per voluntary return.

A German government response to a parliamentary question by the Left Party, published on October 21, 2026, shows that a charter deportation operation to Somalia cost 369,080 euros in aircraft expenses alone.

File photo used as illustration: Deportations from Germany are most often carried out via plane | Photo: Hendrik Schmidt/dpa/picture alliance

On September 15, 23 Somali nationals were flown from the German southern city of Stuttgart to Nairobi and then transferred to Mogadishu on two further charter flights. The flight to Nairobi was accompanied by 78 federal police officers, while airline staff escorted the deportees on the onward flights. Frontex did not reimburse any of the flight costs.

Scheduled commercial flights are generally less expensive than charter flights, particularly for individual returns or small groups.

However, the overall cost of deportations also includes police escorts and other expenses. Germany's federal government reported spending 5.93 million euros on police escorts for deportations in the first half of 2026 alone, in addition to flight costs.

Other issues affecting flight returns

Almost 9,000 deportations failed in Germany in the first half of the year, according to the Bild newspaper. A major reason: The authorities could not find the people subject to deportation on the scheduled date.

In the first half of 2026, 734 deportations were abandoned during or after the handover to the German Federal Police. Resistance by those facing deportation was cited in 130 cases, while medical concerns accounted for 56 cases, according to the federal government's response to a parliamentary question on the issue.

In the first half of 2026, there were 280 cases in which airlines, aircraft commanders or shipping operators refused to transport people facing deportation. This compares with 514 such cases in 2025. The government does not separately record the reasons for these refusals.

Earlier this week, it was reported that the number of deportations from the German capital's new airport in Berlin almost reached 2,600 (2,591) throughout 2025. This was an increase on the numbers of deportations leaving BER in 2024 by around 15 percent. Berlin saw the greatest number of deportations from Germany in 2025, noted Germany's public broadcaster ARD in a report for its news program Tagesschau.