Germany’s sudden migration about-turn is not what it seems

Right-wing protest groups demand deportation of migrants
Right-wing protest groups demand deportation of migrants - YING TANG/NURPHOTO/SHUTTERSTOCK

When news broke that a jumbo jet full of hardened criminals had taken off from Leipzig, in eastern Germany, to Kabul in the early hours of Aug 30, the world was caught by surprise.

No Western country has officially dealt with Kabul since the Taliban’s chaotic takeover of power in Afghanistan in 2021.

But Berlin was determined to rid itself of 20 convicts, among them murderers and rapists, and show it was serious about putting public safety first.

It was the latest shock migration move by Germany, once the European country most welcoming to refugees.

On Thursday, another plan from Berlin sent shock waves across the continent. The country’s migration commissioner proposed taking over Britain’s axed migration deal with Rwanda to put an end to people crossing into the EU from Russia.

The scramble to take a hard line on the issue of migration has exposed a country with a government on the brink, fighting a string of crises as it struggles to cling on to power.

What are presented as serious plans appear to be attempts to stave off electoral defeat to the hard-Right Alternative for Germany (AfD) on migration.

Down and out in polling, the flight to Kabul was just the elixir that Olaf Scholz and his bedraggled government needed.

German politicians led by Olaf Scholz, centre, lay flowers near the scene of the attack in Solingen
German politicians led by Olaf Scholz, centre, lay flowers near the scene of the attack in Solingen - CHRISTOPER NEUNDORF/EPA-EFE/SHUTTERSTOCK

Days beforehand, an Islamist terrorist had rampaged through the streets of Solingen, killing three people and injuring eight more.

At state elections the following weekend, anti-migrant AfD were set to humiliate the chancellor’s Social Democrats (SPD) as voters vented their anger at rising crime associated with the arrival of hundreds of thousands of migrants.

Nancy Faeser, the interior minister, hailed it as a signal that “our security is what matters, our state has shown that it can act”.

The first deportations to Afghanistan since the Taliban came back to power three years ago have done little to quell the public debate, though.

Instead, centrist politicians have entered a bidding war for who can offer the toughest proposals on cutting migration in an attempt to take the wind out of the AfD’s sails.

“Enough is enough,” Friedrich Merz, leader of the opposition Christian Democratic Union (CDU), responded the day after that terror attack, calling for no more Syrians or Afghans to be allowed into the country.

“Deportations need to increase massively,” Alexander Throm, the home affairs spokesman for the CDU in the German parliament, told The Telegraph.

“We need to start deporting to Syria and to keep deporting people to Afghanistan,” he added, claiming that “the security situation in these countries now makes this possible”.

Mr Throm also called for an end to the European practice of providing “subsidiary protection” to migrants from Syria and Afghanistan.

When refugees started arriving en masse from Syria in 2015, EU countries started offering this more basic form of protection to people who arrive from countries affected by civil war.

Those who have this form of asylum need to get their visas renewed on a yearly basis, meaning that withdrawing it would raise questions over the long-term futures of hundreds of thousands of Syrian refugees.

The AfD is on the rise in Germany
The AfD is on the rise in Germany - F BOILLOT/SNAPSHOT PHOTOGRAPHY/SHUTTERSTOCK

Deportations to Syria have been taboo for more than a decade in which Germany has taken international plaudits for providing shelter to over a million people who fled the president Bashar al-Assad’s brutal crackdown against dissidents.

However, even inside Mr Scholz’ centre-Left SPD a consensus is emerging that it is time to reopen channels to the Syrian dictator in order to get rid of the most dangerous criminals who arrived among refugees.

Nils Schmid, the SPD’s foreign affairs spokesman, advocates deporting hardened criminals to Syria. “We won’t get around carrying out technical discussions with the regime in Damascus on issues like deportation,” he says.

Such calls would appear to directly contradict Berlin’s own assessment of the security situation in Syria.

In March the German foreign ministry stated flatly that “a safe return of refugees cannot currently be guaranteed for any region of Syria”.

Another proposal that has raised eyebrows was made by Mr Scholz’s migration commissioner Joachim Stamp, who said that the EU should make use of the detention facilities built in Rwanda for Britain’s now cancelled deportation scheme to the African state.

Berlin’s interior ministry swiftly distanced itself from the comments, saying that Mr Stamp was speaking in his capacity as a politician for the Free Democrats, a junior partner in Mr Scholz’s coalition.

The UK’s Rwanda plan, which the Conservatives dragged on to the statute book through tortuous legal challenges, was ditched in July by the new Labour government after it cost a reported £700 million without a single migrant ever being forcibly expelled to the African country due to repeated legal challenges.

Experts have emphasised that the plans being bandied about in Berlin face similar defeat in the courts unless Berlin can bring about a change to EU law in Brussels, a feat that often involves months of exhausting negotiations.

Matthias Hartwig, an expert on international law at the Max Planck Institute, described all the proposals made in recent days as “problematic”.

Turning people back at the border or deporting migrants to Rwanda would require changes to EU law, while the latter would face a likely legal challenge in the European Court of Human Rights, he points out.

Then UK home secretary Suella Braverman sees houses being constructed in Rwanda for deported migrants
Then UK home secretary Suella Braverman sees houses being constructed in Rwanda for deported migrants - STEFAN ROUSSEAU/PA

Questioning whether the deportations to Kabul were legal, Mr Hartwig said: “Everything that we know suggests that the European Court would not accept” deportations to the Taliban-run country.

Mr Hartwig added that it appeared that none of the deportees on the flight to Afghanistan had appealed the decision, meaning that a dramatic last-minute intervention by the European Court on Human Rights similar to the one that stymied the UK’s Rwanda plan couldn’t take place.

“Protection against expulsion to countries where persons might be subject to torture applies regardless of whether a person is law-abiding or a criminal,” he pointed out.

Berlin has also come in for criticism from rights groups for implicitly recognising the Taliban via its deportation arrangement.

However, Berlin has insisted that, by using Qatar as an intermediary, it was able to square the circle of improving public safety without playing the Islamist group’s game.

“We don’t need to talk to the Taliban, and we won’t,” said foreign minister Annalena Baerbock in conversation with Der Spiegel in which she insisted that Germany would not become the first democratic country to recognise Taliban rule.

“Why should we court the Taliban, who lock women inside their homes, when we don’t have to?” she asked.

In reality, Germany has never completely broken off contact with Kabul.

Afghanistan’s embassy in the leafy west of Berlin never closed after the Taliban takeover in the summer of 2021.

Ambassador Yama Yari, who was appointed before the Taliban captured power, has been seen entering and leaving the foreign ministry building in recent months.

Whether those visits were connected to the recent deportation flights is unclear.