Serious allegations
Federal police abandon Afghan family in Polish village
The Federal Police is facing allegations from Poland
© Matthias Rietschel/DPA-Zentralbild / DPA
The federal police drove a family from Afghanistan back across the border to Poland. There has been criticism of the actions of the German officials from there.
Poland’s border guard has accused the federal police of bringing a family of asylum seekers from Afghanistan across the border without consultation and dropping them off on the Polish side. “The transfer of foreigners to Poland (to the village of Osinow Dolny) by the German police was in violation of the principles of cooperation between the two agencies and the transfer law,” the border guard wrote on Monday on the X platform. “The German authorities must not make such a decision arbitrarily.”
Previously, Polish media had reported, citing eyewitnesses, that a German police car had appeared in the border village of Osinow Dolny on Friday and left a migrant family there.
In a statement by the Federal Police, it was said that as part of the temporarily reintroduced internal border controls, officers stopped an Afghan family of five near Altmädewitz in Brandenburg in the early hours of June 14th, who had attempted to enter the country illegally. The family had Polish asylum certificates for the adults and Polish residence permits for the children; they had not submitted an asylum application to the German officers. According to the law, they should therefore be returned to Poland.
Federal Police: “No reaction from Poland”
According to the Federal Police, the Polish border guards were informed via the Joint Center in Swiecko that the family was to be handed over. “As there was no response from the Polish side for several hours, even when asked, the officers decided to take the family with a patrol to the German-Polish border near Hohenwutzen in order to release them from there to Poland.”
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On the way, the family’s children complained of feeling unwell, which is why the federal police officers headed to a pharmacy in the town of Osinow Dolny to provide first aid. Since the children’s mother had forgotten her cell phone at the federal police station, she was taken back to Brandenburg in a patrol car and then back to her family in Poland.
The incident is being “intensively investigated” with Polish colleagues, the federal police said in a statement. The Polish border guard announced that its top brass would discuss the matter with the federal police leadership on Tuesday.