Despite protests, 14 Afghans deemed dangerous or with criminal status were flown back to Kabul from Bavaria. The send-off marks the 10th round of deportations in Germany since 2016.
Citizens gathered at Munich's airport to protest the deportation of Afghan nationalsImage: picture-alliance/dpa/M. Balk
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The authorities in Munich carried out a fresh round of deportations of Afghan nationals on Tuesday night. Although Germany's Foreign Office has not submitted a new security assessment for Afghanistan, the deportations are allowed to proceed in the meantime.
The security assessment is at the heart of the controversy over Afghan deportations in Germany, with opponents arguing that the country is still not safe for returnees.
The Afghans were sent back to their homeland aboard a German plane. Although the original list contained 58 individuals, only 14 ultimately flew back. Among them, according to information released by the Interior Ministry on its website, there were six people who had been deemed criminals, three identity thieves, and one dangerous individual.
The Bavarian interior minister, Joachim Hermann, said that "dangerous people, criminals, and identity thieves represent clear security problems in our country." Moreover, authorities are hoping that the deportations send "a signal that the rule of law is being applied."
In 2017, Bavaria carried out the deportation of 3,282 people. In particular, of the 121 Afghans that have been deported in Germany, 56 were from Bavaria.
Tuesday night, in the midst of snow and frigid temperatures, some 200 people gathered in Munich's Marienplatz square to protest the deportation policy, in a rally organized by the Bavarian Refugee Council. The group actively supports "a policy of integration and not deportations," according to their mission statement.
Many people in Germany oppose the deportations because of the current human rights and security situation of Afghanistan, which they say is still too dangerous. A recent UN report puts the figure of civilians killed in 2017 at 10,000.
The Taliban and the "Islamic State" groups are still active and carry out terrorist attacks. In Kabul alone, 20 attacks were carried out in 2017.
Still, the government insists that only people with criminal backgrounds are being deported and that in the end, their main responsibility is to protect their citizens from danger.
Deportations from Germany to Afghanistan
Mid-December 2016 saw the first collective deportation of 34 rejected Afghan asylum seekers from Germany to Kabul – the first of many. Germany halted the flights in late May 2017, but has now restarted them.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/M. Balk
By the planeload
On September 12, 2017, a flight left Germany's Düsseldorf airport for Afghanistan, carrying 15 rejected asylum seekers in what is the first group deportation to the country since a deadly car bomb blast near the German embassy in Kabul in late May. The opposition Greens and Left party slammed the resumption of deportations to Afghanistan as "cynical."
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/B. Roessler
Fighting for a chance
In March 2017, high school students in Cottbus made headlines with a campaign to save three Afghan classmates from deportation. They demonstrated, collected signatures for a petition and raised money for an attorney to contest the teens' asylum rejections - safe in the knowledge that their friends, among them Wali (above), can not be deported as long as proceedings continue.
Image: DW/S.Petersmann
'Kabul is not safe'
"Headed toward deadly peril," this sign reads at a demonstration in Munich airport in February. Protesters often show up at German airports where the deportations take place. Several collective deportations left Germany in December 2016, and between January and May 2017. Protesters believe that Afghanistan is too dangerous for refugees to return.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/M. Balk
From Würzburg to Kabul
Badam Haidari, in his mid-30s, spent seven years in Germany before he was deported to Afghanistan in January 2017. He had previously worked for USAID in Afghanistan and fled the Taliban, whom he still fears years later – hoping that he will be able to return to Germany after all.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/C.F. Röhrs
Persecuted minorities
In January of the same year, officials deported Afghan Hindu Samir Narang from Hamburg, where he had lived with his family for four years. Afghanistan, the young man told German public radio, "is not safe." Minorities from Afghanistan who return because asylum is denied face religious persecution in the Muslim country. Deportation to Afghanistan is "life-threatening" to Samir, says change.org.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/H. Wiedl
Reluctant returnees
Rejected asylum seekers deported from Germany to Kabul, with 20 euros in their pockets from the German authorities to tide them over at the start, can turn to the International Organization for Migration (IOM) for assistance. Funded by the German Foreign Office, members of the IPSO international psychosocial organization counsel the returnees.
