Geographically, Germany is in the center of the EU. In some areas of common politics, however, Berlin moves on the edge of Europe. This has been particularly visible for years when dealing with migration and asylum.
In the migration crisis of 2015/16, Germany quickly became lonely. Partners like Austria and Sweden, who initially supported Angela Merkel’s culture of welcoming, changed their minds. Berlin’s call for hundreds of thousands of migrants to be distributed across the EU states in solidarity found hardly any supporters.
Seven years later, something revolutionary happens: A red-green-yellow federal government is making the big leap from the periphery to the center of European migration policy. Shortly before the inner-German refugee summit on May 10, the traffic light coalition supports the Proposal of the EU Commissionto transfer asylum procedures to the external borders.
Interior Minister Faeser: Historical Momentum
Federal Interior Minister Nancy Faeser speaks of a “historic momentum” for a common EU course. It was her SPD that had rejected such demands when they came from the then coalition partner CDU/CSU and the interior minister was Horst Seehofer.
The ministers of the Greens also support the proposal. When Seehofer proposed transit centers for asylum seekers before entering the EU, Cem Ozdemir and Toni Hofreiter condemned such ideas as “inhumane”, “populist” and “scaremongering”.
1 Overwhelmed municipalities
Why the U-turn? The federal government is under fourfold pressure. First the number of asylum seekers increases after the pandemic years, in Germany in the first quarter of 2023 by 80 percent compared to the same period last year. It was EU-wide Close to a million again in 2022, an increase of 50 percent over the previous year. This is happening parallel to the arrival of hundreds of thousands of war refugees from Ukraine who are allowed to remain without asylum procedures.
The German municipalities are reaching the limits of their capacity: from accommodation and schooling for non-German-speaking children to psychological care for traumatized people. They demand relief through a de facto reduction in new arrivals.
The widespread feeling of being overwhelmed and the experiences with the migration crisis of 2015/16 stand in the way of a renewed ideological charging that the question is whether Germany wants to be an open or a closed country.
2 international trend
Secondly, there is an international discussion on how refugees can be persuaded to stay in the first country in which they no longer have to fear for their life and limb after leaving their homeland. And what deterrent measures can be taken to prevent them from migrating further to the richer countries they want.
The British Parliament has decided Interning boat people who reach the Kingdom without entry permits. They are not allowed to apply for asylum and should be deported directly to their countries of origin. Or, if that’s not possible, to a third country like Rwanda that is willing to accept them.
In the US, Joe Biden had promised during the 2020 election campaign to end Donald Trump’s inhumane treatment of migrants from Latin America on the southern border. However, as illegal entries continued to increase, he and his vice president, Kamala Harris, did little to change the deterrent practice.
Will Britain leave the Council of Europe?
This international dynamic influences the debates in the EU. The Commission’s proposals are more moderate than the drastic methods in Great Britain or the USA. In addition, the European Court of Human Rights is likely to rule the UK law illegal. Then London must either give in or withdraw from the Council of Europe.
But the trend towards tougher treatment of refugees and asylum seekers is also evident in the EU. EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and individual heads of government like the Luxembourg Xavier Bettel had long refused on principle to grant EU funds for the construction of physical border barriers. A Fortress Europe would be “a disgrace”. Now the EU is paying for the construction of a fence on Bulgaria’s border with Turkey.
Poland was initially heavily criticized for the high steel barriers on the eastern border with Belarus. Meanwhile, MEPs are praising Warsaw for fending off the destabilizing strategies of authoritarian rulers like Alexander Lukashenko and Vladimir Putin.
3 CDU/CSU can now oppose openly
Thirdly, under these impressions, the inner-German evaluation framework shifts, which demands are considered offensive and which are capable of winning a majority. The CDU and CSU are now opposition parties and their deputies are freed from the obligation to remain loyal to criticism of their own government’s course if it seems too liberal to them.
There are factual necessities to which politics must respond.
Thorsten Frei, Parliamentary Secretary of the CDU/CSU parliamentary group
Thorsten Frei, Parliamentary Secretary of the Union faction, Faeser’s support for the new, tougher EU course does not go far enough. He sees “actual necessities to which politics must react”.
He wants relocate all asylum procedures to the EU’s external borders, restricting the options for rejected asylum seekers to file a lawsuit a fixed upper limit for migration. The traffic light accuses Frei of wanting to stick to the German special path in Europe and only accommodating the EU on detailed questions for tactical reasons.
Anyone who is there stays – even if asylum is rejected
The media prominently report rapes, physical injuries and killings by rejected asylum seekers who have not been deported. Although they are not significant in numbers, they create an atmosphere as if tolerating potential violent criminals is more important to the state than protecting citizens.
They denounce that there are hardly any deportations. Irrespective of the outcome of an asylum procedure, the following applies: whoever is there, stays. 2022 lived scarce 300,000 foreigners who are required to leave GermanyAscending trend.
4 Germany in the pillory of Europe
Fourth, Germany’s standing and influence in the EU has declined. From the point of view of the partners, his Russia and energy policy has failed dramatically. Why should they have confidence in the strategic far-sightedness of German asylum and migration policy if it deviates from the will of the majority of Europeans?
This “historical momentum” – Germany in the pillory – explains the swing of the traffic light more convincingly than the interpretation that Faeser comes up with: that recently more EU states are willing to distribute those entitled to asylum as desired by Berlin, provided that the procedures are transferred to the external borders.
Incidentally, the states that most strongly oppose the distribution, including Poland and Hungary, have not yet said that they support the EU proposal. Your demands go much further.
The practical need is forcing Germany to reconsider its asylum policy. The current EU proposals are already bitter for many Greens and Social Democrats. They will probably have to accept further impositions from the European hardliners.
Because without an EU-wide agreement, Germany will remain the main port of call for refugees and migrants – and the overloading of the municipalities will not end. Germany cannot hold out much longer. In 2023 the world will be different than in 2015.
