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IMMIGRATION

German interior minister unhappy with Merkel’s EU migration deal

German Interior Minister Horst Seehofer is unhappy with Chancellor Angela Merkel's deal with other EU nations to slash immigration, sources from his CSU party told AFP Sunday, a sign she may have failed to defuse tensions within her conservative alliance.

Published: 1 July 2018 16:54 CEST
German interior minister unhappy with Merkel's EU migration deal
File photo of Angela Merkel and Horst Seehofer. Photo: ODD ANDERSEN / AFP
Seehofer complained to fellow party leaders in Munich that he had engaged Merkel in a “conversation with no effect” Saturday about his plan to turn away asylum seekers already registered in other EU countries, the sources said.
 
Merkel is engaged in a fight for her political survival with the rebellious CSU, which has pressured her for weeks to get tough on immigration and asylum as it fears being outflanked to the right by anti-immigrant, anti-Islam Alternative for Germany (AfD).
 
The chancellor rejects Seehofer's plan for Germany to unilaterally turn away at the border already-registered asylum seekers, preferring to seek cooperation with Germany's neighbours.
 
 
At her urging, EU leaders last week agreed to a slew of measures to reduce immigration to the bloc and so-called “secondary migration” of asylum seekers between countries.
 
Merkel also said she had struck deals with 16 other countries for them to take back already-registered asylum seekers, although central European nations including Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic and Slovakia denied any such agreement.
 
If Seehofer rejects Merkel's approach and orders border police to begin turning away already-registered asylum seekers, she would be forced to fire him, effectively exploding her conservative camp and robbing her ruling coalition with the Social Democratic Party (SPD) of a majority in parliament.

CRIME

Germany mulls expulsions to Afghanistan after knife attack

Germany said Tuesday it was considering allowing deportations to Afghanistan, after an asylum seeker from the country injured five and killed a police officer in a knife attack.

Published: 4 June 2024 14:50 CEST
Germany mulls expulsions to Afghanistan after knife attack

Officials had been carrying out an “intensive review for several months… to allow the deportation of serious criminals and dangerous individuals to Afghanistan”, Interior Minister Nancy Faeser told journalists.

“It is clear to me that people who pose a potential threat to Germany’s security must be deported quickly,” Faeser said.

“That is why we are doing everything possible to find ways to deport criminals and dangerous people to both Syria and Afghanistan,” she said.

Deportations to Afghanistan from Germany have been completely stopped since the Taliban retook power in 2021.

But a debate over resuming expulsions has resurged after a 25-year-old Afghan was accused of attacking people with a knife at an anti-Islam rally in the western city of Mannheim on Friday.

A police officer, 29, died on Sunday after being repeatedly stabbed as he tried to intervene in the attack.

Five people taking part in a rally organised by Pax Europa, a campaign group against radical Islam, were also wounded.

Friday’s brutal attack has inflamed a public debate over immigration in the run up to European elections and prompted calls to expand efforts to expel criminals.

READ ALSO: Tensions high in Mannheim after knife attack claims life of policeman

The suspect, named in the media as Sulaiman Ataee, came to Germany as a refugee in March 2013, according to reports.

Ataee, who arrived in the country with his brother at the age of only 14, was initially refused asylum but was not deported because of his age, according to German daily Bild.

Ataee subsequently went to school in Germany, and married a German woman of Turkish origin in 2019, with whom he has two children, according to the Spiegel weekly.

Per the reports, Ataee was not seen by authorities as a risk and did not appear to neighbours at his home in Heppenheim as an extremist.

Anti-terrorism prosecutors on Monday took over the investigation into the incident, as they looked to establish a motive.

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