Bamf
Faeser: More support for refugee accommodation
Federal Interior Minister Nancy Faeser visiting the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees in Nuremberg. photo
© Daniel Karmann/dpa
Refugees from Ukraine and asylum seekers from other countries push the municipalities to their limits. Federal Minister of the Interior Faeser promises help – also with a view to the winter.
The municipalities should get more support in view of the increasing number of war refugees and asylum seekers. They are heavily burdened and are reaching the limits of their capacity, said Federal Interior Minister Nancy Faeser during a visit to the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees (Bamf) in Nuremberg. Among other things, the SPD politician wants to make more federal real estate available that could be used as accommodation. On Tuesday she wants to meet with representatives from municipalities and states to coordinate refugee aid – also with regard to the winter months, as Faeser emphasized.
Over a million refugees from Ukraine
According to Faeser, more than a million people from Ukraine who fled the Russian war of aggression are now registered in Germany. Around 140,000 attended an integration course. However, the exact number of Ukrainians living here is unclear because some of them may have already left Germany.
The current migration report by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) speaks of a historic mass exodus as a result of the Russian attack on Ukraine. According to this, around five million people fled from Ukraine to the OECD countries by mid-September alone. After Poland, Germany is the most important receiving country in the OECD. According to the researchers, the reception and integration of the Ukrainians worked much better than in the refugee crisis of 2015. The organization, headquartered in Paris, is an association of 38 countries.
Asylum application numbers are increasing
Faeser said that more people are currently coming to Europe via the Mediterranean and the Balkan route, and that worries her, said Faeser. “The number of asylum applications has increased in recent months, as have the number of illegal entries.” The pressure at the EU’s external borders is increasing overall. “We observe that every year in summer and autumn, but this year this development is more dynamic,” said Faeser.
According to Bamf, almost 135,000 people applied for asylum from the beginning of the year to September, almost 35 percent more than in the same period last year. New highs were reached in the integration courses, said Bamf President Hans-Eckhard Sommer. The number of entitlements has already exceeded half a million and will even surpass the previous record from 2016 by the end of the year.
Feaser wants to limit migration via the Balkans
Looking at the burden on local authorities, Faeser said she is also counting on international efforts to limit migration across the Balkans. To this end, she has already started talks with her colleagues in Austria and the Czech Republic, who are now checking the borders with Slovakia more closely, she said. Faeser had already extended border controls with Austria in May. At the border with the Czech Republic, the federal police are also increasingly using veiled manhunts to stop illegal entries.