Asylum policy is complex and full of conundrums and dilemmas. That is one reason why the idea of external processing has resurfaces regularly in the European debate. It appears as a seemingly easy solution cutting the Gordian knot. More recently, the British ‘Rwanda Star’ has stirred controversies, while the ‘disembarkation platforms’, supported by the European Council in June 2018, were not realised. Somewhat surprisingly, the coalition agreement of the German government took up the idea, as…