It is election season in Brandenburg, and the issue of migration is heating up tempers. State Interior Minister Stübgen is calling for a hard line on the issue – and a change to the constitution.
In the migration debate, Brandenburg’s Interior Minister Michael Stübgen (CDU) is in favor of abolishing the right to asylum in its current form. “The individual right to asylum is no longer necessary in the Basic Law because, according to the rules of the Geneva Refugee Convention, we already grant protection to people who are persecuted,” the chairman of the Interior Ministers’ Conference (IMK) told the “Handelsblatt”. “That is why I am in favor of anchoring the Geneva Refugee Convention as an institutional guarantee in the Basic Law.”
Stübgen made the suggestion a few days before the state elections in his state, which are also marked by a possible AfD victory. Without the right to asylum, it would be possible to introduce refugee quotas, the interior politician emphasized. “We will then decide who comes to our country. And we can determine to what extent we can accept and integrate migrants.” Similar proposals have already been made by the Union. However, Stübgen does not seem to think the chances of a change to the constitution are high: “That’s why we are now concentrating on what is feasible.”
Stübgen: First determine national emergency
The minister called for a national emergency to be declared so that people seeking protection could be turned back at the borders. He is convinced that this is legally possible, even if the number of new arrivals is currently declining, he told the newspaper. “The burdens are no longer bearable.” In order for the rejections to be successful, negotiations must be held with neighboring countries.
“I would recommend that Foreign Minister (Annalena) Baerbock flies a little less to Israel and talks a little more with our neighboring countries about how to deal with it if we declare an emergency,” he said, referring to the Green politician. Poland and Austria have already sharply criticized the possible rejection of asylum seekers at their borders with Germany, which the Union has been calling for for some time.
Until now, the practice was for asylum seekers to be checked at the border to see whether they had already submitted or could have submitted a corresponding application in another EU country. According to the so-called Dublin procedure, they could then be returned there with the consent of that country. However, this necessary consent is often not granted and the asylum seekers remain in Germany.
Source: Stern
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