The German government is currently negotiating with at least six countries regarding concluding immigration agreements, enabling it to return people who have no right to stay there to their countries of origin, while observers have questioned the effectiveness of this measure given the scarcity of asylum seekers coming from at least two of these countries.
The German Interior Ministry said, in response to an inquiry, that the Federal Government Special Commissioner for Migration Agreements, Joachim Stamp, appointed to conclude the agreements, is currently holding secret discussions with several countries. The ministry added: “Georgia, Moldova, Kenya, Colombia, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan can currently be mentioned,” according to the Deutsche Welle website.
The German ruling coalition, made up of the Social Democratic Party, the Green Party and the Free Democratic Party, sees migration agreements as the key to regulating immigration to Germany. The three parties have already agreed in the coalition formation agreement to appoint a special commissioner for this purpose.
Stamp began his work on February 1 of this year. Shortly before that – in early December 2022 – the first “Migration and Mobility Partnership Agreement” was signed with India, which has been in force since last March, but remains the only agreement concluded today.
However, Germany has signed at least two declarations of intent with the two Central Asian countries, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan, and the latter was signed with Kyrgyzstan last Friday, during the Central Asia Summit with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz.
This is what observers considered ineffective in stopping the flow of asylum seekers, especially since from these two countries very few come to Germany.
According to statistics from the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees, 60 people from Kyrgyzstan and 100 people from Uzbekistan came to Germany during the period from January to August of this year.
In total, Germany received more than 220,000 asylum applications during this period, out of which there were from Kenya (272 applications), Colombia (2037 applications) and Moldova (2124 applications), and these countries are also not considered among the main countries of origin from which refugees arrive. Georgia on the other hand with (7,405 applications) ranked slightly higher in the statistics.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz had expressed his support for tightening deportation rules for rejected asylum seekers. In the summer interview with German television channel ZDF, Scholz answered on Sunday (August 13) “yes” in response to a question about whether he supports German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser’s plans to tighten deportation rules for asylum seekers obligated to leave the country.
