The Netherlands can stop providing accommodation to third country nationals who were living in Ukraine before the Russian invasion, the European Court of Justice said on Thursday.

The court’s advocate general had reached a similar conclusion in October.

Some 2,500 third-party nationals, often students, workers or people married to Ukrainians, came to the Netherlands after the invasion and a mishmash of conflicting legal decisions had led to confusion about what rights they have to stay in the country.

The foreign students and workers who were in Ukraine before the invasion had been ordered to go home earlier this year, but many had challenged the Dutch government’s position in court.

The highest Dutch court, the Council of State, then referred the issue to the European court for its view.

The court said the temporary protection scheme introduced in the wake of the invasion, is “exceptional in nature and must be reserved for cases of a mass influx of displaced persons”.

In that context, the court said, “a member state which has granted optional temporary protection to a category of persons may, in principle, withdraw the benefit of that protection from those persons”.

The ruling means people from third countries can lose their right to work, education and accommodation if the government decides to call a halt.

Aid group MiGreat said the verdict is shocking. “It makes it clear that discrimination on the basis of nationality is accepted by European Union judges,” director Roos Ykema told news agency ANP.