EU court OKs lifetime entry bans in terror cases, with strict checks

A deported man's fight to return to Europe took a turn Thursday as EU judges signaled governments can keep people out for life in terrorism cases but only if there is a clear justification.

DT, the applicant, was living in Bremen, a northern German city near the Dutch border, with a valid residence permit when everything changed in March 2017. German authorities ordered his removal based on intelligence suggesting he could carry out a terrorist attack. He challenged the move through Germany's highest courts and even to Europe's human rights court in Strasbourg, but lost. He was deported to Russia later that year.

The legal saga did not end there. In 2022, German authorities imposed a formal, indefinite ban on his return. DT challenged that move, arguing EU law requires entry bans to be time-limited.

That dispute put Germany's courts in a bind. A higher administrative court in Bremen ultimately asked the Court of Justice of the European Union whether such open-ended bans are allowed under EU law.

The answer was not a clear win or loss for DT. Judges said EU law does not prevent lifetime entry bans in terrorism cases, but it also does not give governments free rein. Countries can impose open-ended bans only if they carefully assess each individual case and justify why such a far-reaching measure is necessary.

Under EU return rules, people ordered to leave the bloc are usually barred from coming back for up to five years. But that changes when authorities consider someone a serious threat.

Here, the court made clear the law leaves that door open. "No maximum time limit is expressly laid down for the case where the third-country national constitutes a serious threat to public policy, public security or national security," the court said.

Judges added: "If the EU legislature had also intended to impose a maximum period in the event that the third-country national constitutes a serious threat to public policy, public security or national security, it would have expressly done so."

Still, they stressed this is not a rubber stamp. Lifetime bans cannot be handed out by default and must be backed by an individualized assessment of the person and the risk they pose.

That is where the case now lands back in Germany. The law tilts toward indefinite bans in serious security cases, including terrorism, but still allows exceptions. EU judges left it to German courts to decide whether that flexibility is applied in practice.

Steve Peers, a professor of EU and human rights law at Royal Holloway, University of London, said the judgment resolves a long-standing ambiguity. It settles "whether an entry ban could be indefinite where migrants were believed to be connected with terrorism — on the side of national governments that might want to issue an indefinite ban in such cases."

At the same time, he noted the court doubled down on checks. Like in other recent rulings, he said, judges are "stressing safeguards as a means of ensuring fundamental rights, while allowing member states to take restrictive measures as regards migration."

For DT's legal team, that balance cuts both ways.

Christine Graebsch, a law professor and counsel for DT, said the ruling opens the door to lifetime bans but raises serious concerns about how they are applied in practice. Speaking alongside Martin von Borstel and Nina Markovic, lawyers in Bremen also working on the case, she warned "It is concerning that the court appears to regard indefinite reentry bans as generally compatible with EU law," especially in a system where individual circumstances are often treated as the exception rather than the rule.

But the judgment also sets a high bar. Authorities have to assess each case individually, take a fresh look at the person's situation and show the ban is still justified based on current risks. In Graebsch's view, that demand clashes with a system that tends to default to open-ended bans, raising real doubts about whether countries can meet that standard in practice.

Authorities in Bremen did not respond to a request for comment.

Across Europe, a string of attacks over the past decade has pushed governments to take a harder line on security. The 2015 Paris attacks that killed 130 people, the 2016 bombings in Brussels and the truck attack at a Berlin Christmas market later that year all led to tighter controls on who can stay, who must leave and who is allowed back.

That tougher approach has not gone unchecked. European courts have made clear governments still need to justify what they are doing. This ruling follows that line, allowing strong security measures but making clear they cannot be automatic.

The case now returns to the German court that asked the question, which must decide whether the indefinite ban on DT meets that standard. The EU court's interpretation is final, leaving little room to revisit the legal framework but setting the stage for how it will be applied.