Fewer unauthorized entries in Germany
Published: Thursday, Dec 7th 2023, 16:00
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The number of unauthorized entries into Germany fell sharply in November compared to the previous month.
According to an answer from the Federal Government to a question from MP Clara Bünger (Left Party), the Federal Police detected a total of 4353 unauthorized entries at land borders between 1 and 23 November and ordered 2299 refoulements.
According to statistics published on Thursday by the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees (Bamf), 304,581 foreigners applied for asylum in Germany for the first time between the beginning of January and the end of November - around 60 percent more than in the same period last year.
With more than 55,000 asylum applications since the beginning of the year, Turkey was the second most popular country of origin after Syria, ahead of Afghanistan. As it usually takes several weeks between entry and the formal application for asylum, the decline in the number of people crossing the border without a visa is not yet reflected in the Bamf's statistics.
In October, 18,384 unauthorized entries were counted at the German land borders - most of them in the first half of the month. A comparison with the months of previous years also illustrates the relatively low figures: In the entire month of November 2021, the Federal Police recorded 7543 unauthorized entries at all borders, compared to 12,538 unauthorized entries in November last year.
According to the data, there was a significant decrease in the first weeks of November not only at the borders with Poland, the Czech Republic and Switzerland, where fixed border controls have been in place since October 16, but also at the border with Austria. Such stationary controls had already been ordered there in the fall of 2015 and have been repeatedly extended since then.
According to provisional figures from the German Federal Police, 921 unauthorized persons were detected at the German-Austrian border between 1 and 23 November and 493 deportations were ordered. In the previous month, more than 6921 illegal immigrants had been found there. The main countries of origin of the 4820 people who were turned back at Germany's borders in October were Turkey, Syria, Afghanistan and Morocco.
The German Police Union (GdP) suspects that the sharp decline in recent weeks is only to a small extent due to the border controls ordered by Federal Interior Minister Nancy Faeser (SPD) in mid-October. However, observers see a certain domino effect, i.e. that bordering countries and their neighbors have subsequently strengthened their own border protection. Andreas Rosskopf, responsible for federal police and customs at the GdP, notes that Austria and Slovakia have recently intensified their border controls with Hungary.
Border controls are not actually planned within the Schengen area and must be reported to Brussels. If it is only a few days, this can be done with a short notice period. However, this option ends after two months, in the case of Germany on December 15.
However, observers expect - not least because Federal Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) announced this in the Bundestag - that Faeser will maintain the controls at least on the borders with Poland and the Czech Republic in the longer term and will inform the EU Commission of this soon.
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