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Chancellor Olaf Scholz has proposed talks with the main opposition party and Germany’s regional leaders on toughening immigration policy after a terror attack on Friday that killed three people.
The talks would focus on how to improve Germany’s record on deporting failed asylum seekers to their countries of origin and fighting Islamist terrorism, as well as possible changes to the country’s gun laws.
“We will not just return to business as usual, we will learn our lessons,” said Scholz after a meeting with UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer.
Scholz said interior minister Nancy Faeser would “very soon” hold talks with the opposition Christian Democratic Union as well as representatives from the 16 states and relevant federal ministries to discuss immigration.
The overture to the opposition is a sign of the deep unease that Friday’s attack has generated in Berlin. The alleged attacker in the western city of Solingen was a Syrian national whose asylum request had been rejected and who was supposed to have been deported to Bulgaria, the country where he first entered the EU. The deportation never took place, however.
The man, identified by authorities only as Issa Al H because of German privacy laws, is suspected of stabbing three people to death in Solingen on Friday and injuring eight others. Terror group Isis has claimed responsibility for the attack. Issa Al H turned himself in to police on Saturday and was remanded in custody.
The attack in Solingen has cast a long shadow over two elections in the eastern states of Saxony and Thuringia this Sunday. The votes could deliver strong gains for the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD).
CDU leader Friedrich Merz had offered to work with Scholz and his Social Democratic party on updating Germany’s immigration policy, even at the expense of upsetting Scholz’s coalition partners, the Greens and liberals.
Over the weekend, Merz said the government should immediately stop accepting refugees from Syria and Afghanistan and start deporting criminals from both countries.
Scholz and Merz discussed the issues in the chancellery on Tuesday, but the chancellor has been cool on Merz’s proposals, saying the right to asylum, which is enshrined in Germany’s constitution, cannot be abolished.
The government said it is making progress on deportations. According to the interior ministry, 9,500 people were deported from Germany in the first half of 2024, compared with 7,861 in the same period of 2023. The ministry said 16,430 people were deported in 2023, up from 13,000 in 2022.
But so far authorities are not deporting anyone to Syria and Afghanistan, largely because of the security situation in the two countries, though Scholz announced in June that ministers were exploring ways to allow repatriations of Syrians and Afghans who have committed serious crimes.
“That’s why the government will continue its efforts to further restrict irregular immigration,” he said.
He said ministers had been working hard since the weekend on a series of legislative initiatives to address the issue.
“These will include a toughening up of laws on weapons, measures against violent Islamism and measures to do with the right of residence, especially ones that will make it even easier to deport people,” Scholz said.