The state accommodation of further refugees from Ukraine is secured in the short term for the time being, “in the next two weeks we will not be faced with the situation that we can no longer accommodate them”. Interior Minister Joachim Herrmann (CSU) said this on Thursday during a visit to the State Office for Asylum and Repatriations (LfAR) in Ingolstadt, where he presented the asylum balance sheet for 2021 with its President Axel Ströhlein. The focus was on migration before the Ukraine war and before the current influx – and yet both are connected.
Of the more than 90,000 people from Ukraine who have arrived in Bavaria since the beginning of the Russian invasion (but who have also traveled onward), 66,000 have been registered so far – 33,800 of them are quartered in institutions of the Free State and municipalities. A large part, according to Herrmann, is in private rooms, “partly mediated, partly specifically to friends and acquaintances”. Compatriots are a “main point of contact”: Even before the war, around 30,000 Ukrainian citizens were registered as paying social security contributions in Bavaria, and a further 10,000 had been naturalized in the past 15 years. The “anchor” centers and decentralized homes must now “be filled to the brim again and every bed used”. Together with the new capacities created in the municipalities within weeks, there would still be 22,000 places available, said Herrmann. At the same time, however, it should be noted that the high proportion of private accommodation “certainly will not last forever”. Nevertheless, there is initially a “certain composure” when it comes to capacities.
Even before the Ukraine war, state accommodations were not empty – because migration with asylum requests, although by no means on the scale of 2015 and 2016, did not stop last year either. The balance sheet presented shows this: In 2021, the number of first-time asylum applications rose again to almost 21,000, after falling to 12,300 in the first year of Corona due to the circumstances. For comparison: 2016 saw the highest mark at 82,000. The main countries of origin in 2021 were Syria (34 percent), Afghanistan (17) and Iraq (12). Overall, the competent Federal Office for Migration and Refugees (Bamf) approved a third of applications. “As a result, almost two-thirds have no right to stay,” emphasized Herrmann. “Anyone who does not receive protection status has to leave our country again.”
Deportations are still difficult because of the pandemic. Last year, 1913 people were repatriated, the deportation of criminals and people who are dangerous is a focus of the work of the LfAR. 57 percent of those deported from Bavaria in 2020 and 2021 had previously appeared to the police, 43 percent of those deported in 2021 were even criminals who had been convicted. In addition, there were slightly more voluntary departures in Bavaria in 2021 with 9768 than in the previous year (7998). Federal and state programs, for example, provide start-up assistance for setting up a business in the country of origin. “In the future, we will continue to prioritize the still limited flight capacities for criminals who are required to leave the country,” announced LfAR boss Ströhlein. A task force is coordinating accelerated deportations here, with a focus on intensive care offenders and sex offenders.
Accommodation capacities will continue to be used through legally organized contingents. So far, 2,700 of the so-called local forces and the Taliban “particularly endangered” people from Afghanistan who are being flown to the Federal Republic have been assigned to Bavaria. This is not finished yet. “We are currently assuming that around 2,500 more Afghan nationals will come to Bavaria and need to be accommodated,” said Herrmann. The state government expects a total of 6,000 immigrants via such legal channels this year. This includes, for example, the humanitarian admission of selected people in need of protection from camps, which is regulated by the United Nations. There is also illegal migration – it is unclear how this will develop after the pandemic has calmed down. All in all, the presentation of the asylum balance and the question of accommodation seems a bit like big calculations – but with largely unclear figures.
Overall, the accommodation of asylum seekers and Ukrainian war refugees will be a “big challenge this year,” said Herrmann. Many Ukrainians are “firmly aware that they will soon be able to return to their homeland”. That’s not certain – that’s why he warns the traffic lights in the federal government, “especially in the current situation” to “further aggravate” the situation through reforms. Herrmann means, for example, the “opportunity right of residence” that the SPD, Greens and FDP are planning according to the coalition agreement. Instead of a chain of tolerations, foreigners with an uncertain status who have been here for five years and have not committed a crime should be given a one-year probationary residence permit – and during this time they can provide integration services under better conditions. Herrmann sees the “danger of additional incentives for more illegal immigration”.
Gülseren Demirel, integration expert for the Greens in the state parliament, contradicted this on Thursday: “All refugees in Bavaria should be given the right to integrate in the Free State”, the right of residence is “exactly the right way”, she said. “Minister of State Herrmann should stop playing off groups of refugees against each other.”
In many places in Bavaria, old and new refugees are currently housed together. This is also the case in Ingolstadt, where the state office is located on the site of the anchor center. The word comes from “arrival, decision, repatriation”; it already bears the hopelessness of staying in the name. The continued existence of the seven centers in Bavaria has been assured by the new Federal Interior Minister Nancy Faeser (SPD), said Herrmann, even if she no longer wants to keep the controversial name.
The large accommodation in Ingolstadt is “occupied to the maximum”. When you visit the site, you can see African boys strolling around in the yard from afar, but almost 200 Ukrainians are also here now. Due to the EU inflow directive, the latter have a limited right of residence; they do not have to go through an asylum procedure, but still have access to asylum seeker benefits; they are allowed to move freely in Europe and can start work without any obstacles. Are there first and second class refugees? He doesn’t see it that way, says the interior minister when asked about it. There are different legal situations due to the EU directive, which is clearly “understandable” – even if “one or the other would like it to be different”.
By the way, the asylum record also shows that: Most of the deportations from Bavaria in 2021 went to Ukraine of all places (127 cases). Herrmann said: “Of course there are currently no returns to Ukraine.”