Germany's lower house of Parliament voted in favor of tighter asylum laws and a new measure that would allow the government to classify safe countries of origin through regulation, without needing approval from the Bundesrat.
A majority of 457 MPs in the lower house of the German Parliament (Bundestag) voted for proposals to tighten the country's asylum laws on Friday, December 5. Just 130 people voted against the laws. Coalition partners of the conservative union parties CDU/CSU and the social democrats SPD voted in favor of the law, alongside members of the right-wing Alternative for Germany (AfD) party. Members of the Green party and the left-wing Die Linke party voted against it.
Following the vote, the new list of 'safe countries' can be implemented via a simple legal regulation, without the need for additional votes in the Bundesrat, the second parliamentary house, made up of representatives from each German state, reported the French news agency Agence France Presse (AFP).
The German government is hoping the new regulations will speed up the asylum process, because applications can be more quickly rejected as "unfounded" if they meet the criteria outlined in the new regulations. Those who are seeking political asylum will not be subject to the new rules, confirmed the German press agency dpa.
Making Germany less attractive to some categories of migrants
The government also hopes that the new rules will make Germany a less attractive destination for those without real grounds for asylum. Rules that say each asylum case should be looked at individually have not changed. It is just that if an individual comes from one of the safe countries, they will have to have real proof of why they believed themselves to be in danger in their home country.
Those from the new list of 'safe countries' will be told ahead of time that their asylum application is unlikely to go through. The new regulations say that anyone from a country on the list who applies will be designated as having an "obviously unfounded claim" unless they are able to prove otherwise. Algeria, India, Morocco and Tunisia have all been added to the list under the new rules.
In 2024, the following countries were declared by the German Federal Agency for Migration and Asylum (BAMF) as safe:
- the Member States of the European Union,
- Albania,
- Bosnia and Herzegovina,
- Georgia,
- Ghana,
- Kosovo,
- North Macedonia,
- Montenegro,
- Republic of Moldova,
- Senegal, and
- Serbia.
State-aided lawyers removed for deportees, German citizenship rules
Under the new regulations, the need to appoint a lawyer for all those who are taken into deportation custody or issued a notice to leave has also been removed. This rule was introduced by the former social-democratic SPD-led coalition, in conjunction with the Green party and the Liberals, in February 2024.
Another part of the legislation relates to citizenship. Anyone who seeks to claim German citizenship by way of fraud, threats, bribery and corruption, or based on false pretexts, will be banned from applying again for citizenship for a period of ten years. This will also apply to those who have been granted citizenship, but are later found to have obtained it via one of these methods.
This rule was added after consultation with the Interior Affairs committee.
Alexander Throm, the parliamentary spokesperson for Interior policy from the leading CDU party, commented that the "political change when it comes to migration policy is continuing to move forward."
Criticism
Left-wing spokesperson from Die Linke, Clara Bünger, accused the government of bringing in a "second-class asylum system," saying that "anyone who comes from a so-called safe country will not have a genuine asylum process but just something that appears to be the process."
Filiz Polat from the Green party said she believed the new laws were "unconstitutional." Christian Wirth from the AfD party in contrast called for even tougher measures, saying that the EU’s asylum policy is "disfunctional," reported dpa.
The new regulations have also been criticized by the pro-migrant organization Pro Asyl. Legal spokesperson Wiebke Judith said that she could see two big problems with the new rules. "A legislative process will be deliberately circumvented, even though it is constitutionally required."
Judith added that the proposals were a "scandal. [...] By abolishing mandatory legal representation in deportation detention, the government is also promoting the possibility of mass unlawful deportations and detention prior to deportation."
The German Lawyers Association (Deutsche Anwaltverein) and the Federal Law Lawyers Association (Bundesrechtsanwaltskammer) have also criticized the decision to remove the right to state-financed legal aid for those who have been served a notice to leave the country, or who have been ordered to go into deportation detention. They said that "deprivation of liberty is one of the most severe restrictions on fundamental rights."
A forum held on Sunday (December 7) by organizations, including churches, working with migrants, asylum seekers and refugees slammed Germany's overall asylum measures, saying the government policy to "systematically limit migration undermines Germany’s basic laws." Some of the measures criticized by members of the congress include the suspension of family reunification, the ending of evacuation programs, like that offered to vulnerable Afghans after the takeover by the Taliban, as well as the practice of turning people away at the border if they could not fulfill certain criteria, reported the Protestant press agency EPD,
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Implementing CEAS
Last week on Friday (December 5), Germany’s regional interior ministers also met to talk about asylum reform, as well as spying and drone control. The ministers met in the northern city of Bremen for their annual autumn conference, alongside Federal Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt (CSU).
German news agency dpa reported that this year, asylum was not the most debated topic on the interior minister’s agenda, because the number of new asylum applications in Germany has been declining this year.
However, the ministers agreed that six German states would begin building capacity for asylum centers, which would be financed by the federal government. This would add facilities to be able to implement the Common European Asylum System (CEAS; in German GEAS), which is due to begin operating towards the middle of next year. This includes the return of asylum seekers to the countries responsible for their asylum procedures under the Dublin Regulation, which Dobrindt plans to accelerate by establishing 'secondary migration centers'.
The state of Hessen is the German state that will build the most places for return procedures for those who either come from a country that has a 20 percent or less chance of being granted protection, or because they have tried to hide their identity, or are identified as criminals. The facilities will be built near Frankfurt’s international airport, reported dpa.
With AFP, dpa, EPD and Reuters