Berner Asyldirektor fordert Abschaffung des Schutzstatus S
Published: Friday, May 3rd 2024, 01:40
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Pierre Alain Schnegg, Director of Asylum in Bern, is calling for the abolition or restriction of protection status S. This no longer primarily benefits Ukrainians, he says, but is abused by Roma.
"The majority of applications for S status are now submitted by Roma. I also hear this from colleagues from other cantons," said the Bernese SVP government councillor in an interview with Tamedia published on Friday. However, he could not give any concrete figures. All applicants had Ukrainian papers. "But we doubt this identity in many cases." Many speak neither Ukrainian nor Russian.
According to Schnegg, protection status S should be replaced by one of the regular residence permits. "However, the condition for this is that those affected are sufficiently integrated to lead an independent life. Anyone who is already here and meets these criteria should be granted residence status. And new arrivals should submit a regular application in future," said the asylum director of Switzerland's second-largest canton. "An alternative to the complete abolition of S status would be to only grant it to Ukrainians from certain regions of the country that have been severely affected by the war."
Schnegg: Logistics behind it all
Most new arrivals with protection status S are no longer directly affected by the war in Ukraine, said Schnegg. "They don't behave like war refugees who are threatened in life and limb. They come and go from one day to the next." He suspects that these people themselves are often exploited by organizations. "There is logistics behind it," says Schnegg. He was unable to give any details about possible masterminds. "We simply find that whole families, sometimes more than ten people, come and then leave a month or two later when they have received the money from the asylum social assistance."
According to Schnegg, of the more than 65,000 people with protection status S throughout Switzerland, over 8,000 live in the canton of Bern.
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