Immigration office shortfalls meant rise in criminals admitted to NL: Report

Due to capacity problems, the Dutch immigration and naturalization service is putting pressure on employees to not revoke the residency permits of asylum seekers convicted of crimes, NRC reported on Thursday. According to the newspaper, this is because the procedures involved in revoking residency permits cost the IND a lot of time and money.

Internal IND documents in the newspaper's possession show that the revocation team in Zwolle is being pressured by management to revoke as few residency permits as possible. "The focus is on quick non-revocation of residency permits (ie the laborious cases). We find that we are too busy with money generating actions", one document states, according to NRC

A whistleblower previously told the newspaper that criminal- or lying asylum seekers wrongly retain their residency permits. An independent committee led by senior official Johan de Leeuw investigated these allegations and last month released a report stating that there were no abuses at the IND, but there are points that need to be improved on. The committee said that the IND does drop the ball when it comes to revoking the residency permits of criminal asylum seekers, but that there is no question of a pattern or intention.