Types of accommodation

Author

JRS Romania

Most asylum seekers are accommodated in Regional Centres for Accommodation and Procedures for Asylum Seekers, managed by IGI-DAI. The management of reception is decentralised to the level of counties.

IGI-DAI confirmed that no new accommodation centres for applicants seeking international protection were established in 2024. Currently, IGI oversees six Regional Centres for Asylum Seekers’ Procedures and Accommodation, located in Timișoara, Șomcuta Mare (Maramureș County), Rădăuți (Suceava County), Galați, Giurgiu, and Bucharest. These centres provide housing for individuals who have applied for protection in Romania, upon request, for the duration of their right to remain in the country, provided they lack the financial means for self-sufficiency.^[1]

The total accommodation capacity across these facilities is 1,100 places, with an additional expansion potential of 262 places. Furthermore, 166 places are available in specially designated closed spaces. Placement in these areas is strictly regulated and occurs only under the conditions expressly outlined in Article 19 of Law No. 122/2006 on Asylum in Romania.^[2]

The capacity of the different Regional Centres operating across the country (see Freedom of Movement) is as follows:

Source: IGI-DAI, January 2025.

Note on the table: According to the IGI 2024 report, the accommodation capacity for asylum seekers has been significantly increased, particularly in the regional centres of Galați and Rădăuți. With support from the European Union Agency for Asylum (EUAA) and external non-reimbursable funding, a total of 540 new places were added in 2024: 240 at the Centre for Accommodation of Foreigners in Public Custody in Arad and 300 in reception centres in 71 modular housing containers which were installed in the regional centres of Maramureș, Rădăuți, and Galați to improve reception infrastructure and prevent overcrowding.^[3] The General Inspectorate for Immigration reported having implemented an AMIF-funded project aimed at expanding the IGI’s capacity to accommodate asylum seekers and modernizing the existing fencing in Galați, a project that aims to allocate space in containers/modular constructions on a metal frame of an administrative type, which will lead to an increase in accommodation capacity at the CRCPSA Galați by 300 places. Furthermore, future projects with non-reimbursable external funding aim to expand the accommodation capacity at the CRPCSA Timișoara by 100 places and at the CRPCSA Rădăuți by 100 places. At the same time, in the context of the implementation of the Operational Plan for technical and operational support granted to Romania by the European Union Agency for Asylum, modular constructions (containers) have been set up as workspaces at the CRPCSA Rădăuți, CRPCSA Galați, and CRPCSA Maramureș, which will increase the number of accommodation places by another 120 (CRPCSA Galați – 28, CRPCSA Rădăuți – 42, CRPCSA Maramureș – 50) as a result of the transfer of the workflow to these spaces.[4]

According to IGI-DAI, the capacity of each centre can be increased in case of need:

• Timisoara centre: the total capacity of the centre can be increased by 10 places;
• Şomcuta Mare: the total capacity of the centre can be increased by 100 places;
• Rădăuţi: the total capacity of the centre can be increased by 20 places;
• Galati: the total capacity of the centre can be increased by 10 places;
• Bucharest: the total capacity of the centre can be increased by 52 places;
• Giurgiu: the total capacity of the centre can be increased by 70 places.

For information about regular transfers of asylum seekers between centres, see Freedom of movement.

There has not been a situation to date whereby asylum seekers were left without accommodation due to a shortage of places in the reception centres.

Initially, under the AMIF program, IGI also aimed to expand the accommodation capacity by 500 places across three centres: Timișoara and Rădăuţi with 100 places each, and Galați with 300 places. However, the planned construction works în Timișoara and Rădăuți were suspended due to a lawsuit filed by the contractor, who contested the contractual value of the construction works. This legal dispute delayed the implementation of the project in those two locations.

As a result of the increase of asylum applications made in Romania, IGI, in accordance with the Emergency Ordinance no. 38 of 10 May 2018, took over a public building, administered by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in order to convert it into an accommodation centre for asylum seekers. The building is located in Crevedia, Dâmbovița County and is intended to have a capacity of 500 places. However, no update regarding the status or progress of the centre was made publicly available in 2024, and it remains unclear whether the facility has become operational.

Asylum seekers may also request to stay in private accommodation at their own cost. In this case, they have to present to IGI-DAI a lease agreement registered with the tax authorities or a commodity contract concluded in authentic form. GI-DAI stated that for 2024 they do not have statistics on the distribution of the total number of residents by gender or on the total number of applicants for international protection living in private housing at the end of the year. Additionally, IGI does not provide private housing for applicants for international protection. ^[5]

According to CNRR,^[6] in 2023, reception conditions and capacity remained stable. However, IGI reported that in 2024, accommodation capacity was expanded through several infrastructure improvements. In October 2023, the IGI regional centre for procedures and accommodation for asylum seekers in Bucharest was reopened after almost 2 years of rehabilitation. It has a capacity of 320 places. According to JRS Romania staff in 2024, the Bucharest reception centre on Vasile Stolnicu Street was fully operational and functioned normally.^[7] During these works, asylum seekers were temporarily accommodated to the General Inspectorate for Immigration premises where the asylum related procedures are carried out (interviews, applications registration etc.).

According to IGI-DAI^[8] at the end of 2024 the situation was the following:

• Bucharest Reception Centre: 79 residents (61 asylum seekers and 18 beneficiaries of international protection) were accommodated on 31 December 2024.
• Galați Reception Centre: 24 residents (9 asylum seekers and 15 beneficiaries of international protection) were accommodated on 31 December 2024.
• Rădăuți Reception Centre: 6 residents (5 asylum seekers and 1 beneficiaries of international protection) were accommodated on 31 December 2024.
• Maramureș Reception Centre: 3 residents (2 asylum seekers and 1 beneficiaries of international protection) were accommodated on 31 December 2024.
• Timișoara Reception Centre: 32 residents (19 asylum seekers and 13 beneficiaries of international protection) were accommodated on 31 December 2024.
• Giurgiu Reception Centre: 24 residents (19 asylum seekers and 5 beneficiaries of international protection) were accommodated on 31 December 2024.

During the Romanian Ombudsman visits in the reception centres in 2022, the common problems identified were: some toilets and the kitchen (area to prepare the food) were in a poor state of cleanliness and hygiene, not enough specialised medical staff (e.g. medication for people with mental was distributed for several days without medical supervision). Asylum seekers are accommodated according to gender criteria, i.e. women and men, and unaccompanied minors are accommodated separately from adults.^[9] Some problems were improved throughout the years and in 2024, following visits by the Romanian Ombudsperson to the Regional Centres for Accommodation and Procedures for Asylum Seekers (CRPCSA) in Timișoara and Șomcuta Mare, overall hygiene and accommodation conditions were found to be satisfactory, with gender and age-based separation properly ensured. However, a common concern identified in 2024 was the insufficient availability of specialized medical personnel, particularly for vulnerable individuals, alongside the need to improve interpretation support in psychological and medical services.^[10]

^[1]       Information provided by IGI-DAI, 23 January 2025.

^[2]       ibid.

^[3]        According to the Assessment of the activity of the general inspectorate for immigration in the year 2024 of the General Inspectorate for Immigration (IGI), published in April 2025, available here.

[4]          Inspectorate General for Immigration (IGI), Reply on the 2024 AIDA country report on Romania, 14 August 2025.

^[5]          Information provided by IGI-DAI, 23 January 2025.

^[6]          CNRR, Input by civil society organisations to the Asylum Report 2024, 2023, available here.

^[7]          Information provided by JRS Romania in January 2025.

^[8]          Information provided by IGI-DAI, 23 January 2025.

^[9]          Ombudsman, Centres for migration 2022 reports, can be found here.

^[10]         Ombudsman, Centres for migration 2024 reports, can be found here.