After the deadly knife attack in the German city of Solingen, Federal Chancellor Olaf Scholz announced that he would draw swift conclusions in relation to this crime. "Everything within our power, within our capabilities, must be done," Scholz said during a visit to the scene of the attack in central Solingen. However, the government and the opposition in Germany have different ideas about what should be done, notes the "Süddeutsche Zeitung".
On the one hand, gun ownership rules should become even stricter, Scholz explained. This applies above all to the use of knives and this tightening "will now happen very quickly”. On the other hand, "everything possible will have to be done to ensure that those who cannot and should not stay here in Germany are repatriated and deported", with the chancellor only hinting at possible changes here in migration policy.
Scholz pointed out that the ruling coalition has already facilitated deportations. In January, the Bundestag decided, among other things, on longer detention of migrants awaiting deportation and on expanded police powers during this process. According to Scholz, since then the number of deportations has increased by 30%, and since the introduction of border controls, illegal migration has also decreased. However, this "is by no means a reason to sit back and relax” and there should be further legal changes, "if necessary”, he believes.
Federal Interior Minister Nancy Feser and Federal Justice Minister Marco Buschmann also said the government would discuss new measures in the fight against Islamism, faster deportations to other EU countries and stricter gun laws.
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"That's the triad we're working on right now,” Bushman said Monday.
Chancellor Scholz said in Solingen that he was "angry and angry” of the attack: "This is terrorism, terrorism against all of us”. On Friday evening, during the celebration of Solingen's 650th anniversary, an attacker stabbed two men and a woman to death and injured eight people, some seriously. A 26-year-old Syrian man was detained for the attack on Sunday evening. The suspect arrived in Germany on Christmas Day 2022. He was identified as Issa al-H., who, according to federal prosecutors, shared the ideology of the terrorist organization "Islamic State”. After arriving in Germany, he requested asylum there. An attempt to return him from Germany to Bulgaria - the EU country where the Syrian first entered the bloc's territory and which, under the Dublin rules, is responsible for processing his asylum application - failed in June 2023. At the time, the man could not be discovered. He only reappeared after the deadline for his deportation had passed - another element of the crime that is now fueling the debate over how to deal with refugees.
"If something is wrong, it must be clearly stated,”, North Rhine-Westphalia state premier Hendrik Wüst said in Solingen. He called on the federal government to tighten its asylum policy: "Statements alone will not be enough.”. The question is "should people who do not have a permanent right to be here be able to leave this country more easily, or should it be preferable not to come at all”. It should also be possible to deport people in parts of Syria and Afghanistan, the CDU politician said. This would require a new assessment of the situation by the Federal Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Thus, he repeated the demand that CDU leader Friedrich Merz had already made.
The leader of the CDU/CSU parliamentary group Torsten Frey emphasized that in terms of migration policy "we now need a big step forward, essentially a fundamental reversal compared to previous policies”.
Mertz called on Scholz to bear the consequences of the Solingen attack. CDU and CSU do not want to participate in the government, but are ready to support "reasonable” laws if Chancellor Scholz, who is from the Social Democrats, does not find a majority in the coalition, Merz said at an event in Dresden on Monday evening. He called the planned tightening of gun laws "complete nonsense" that would achieve nothing.
In November last year, the meeting where Scholz and Merz discussed the subject of migration did not lead to any results. Now the German government has also made it clear that it rejects major parts of the list of demands presented by Merz. For example, the chairman of the CDU demanded that no more people from Syria and Afghanistan be accepted. On Monday, government spokesman Steffen Hebestreit rejected that request. Such a ban on admission would violate the Basic Law and the EU Convention on Human Rights. It's something that "no one wants to take seriously," said Hebestreit.
The rhetoric regarding the granting of asylum in Germany has intensified even more since what happened in Solingen. After the attack in Solingen, the leader of the new party bearing her name, Sarah Wagenknecht, is calling for a radical change in Germany's current asylum and migration policy. "A clear signal must be sent to the world," Wagenknecht told Welt. "Anyone who allows uncontrolled migration will get uncontrolled violence,”, she added.
CDU leader Friedrich Merz called on Germany to stop accepting refugees from Syria and Afghanistan. Zet De Ef quoted his position as stated in his newsletter "MerzMail": "After the terrorist act in Solingen, it should now be definitively clear: the problem is not the knives, but the people who walk around with them." And AER De TV quoted Merz as saying he hoped the tragedy in Solingen would lead to a major change in the current federal government's policy on asylum and migration.
"Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung" notes that there are fears that the attack in Solingen will increase support for "Alternative Germany". The reasons for this will not be rooted in the appeal of the extreme right, the newspaper points out. It will simply be a turning away from a politician whose actions and whose inaction can no longer be explained and justified.
The knife attack has renewed a heated debate over migration in Germany ahead of elections in three states where the far-right anti-immigration party Alternative for Germany is expected to (AzG) to realize serious positive results for it, notes "Politico".
Scholz has promised to increase deportations, maintain border checks introduced during the European football championship and tighten gun rules, especially regarding the "use of knives".
But those promises are unlikely to help quell the bitter immigration debate that has erupted since the attack. Migration is a major issue among voters ahead of the three regional votes in eastern Germany in September. The far-right Alternative for Germany party, which declares itself against immigration, leads or is close to the lead in opinion polls in all three provinces.
"In view of the daily reports of violence by foreigners, it is no longer possible to say that such events are unpredictable and surprising," wrote on the social network "X" Björn Höcke, the leading candidate of the A3G in the state of Thuringia, where the election is on September 1. "This is why governments are complicit. Circumstances will only change when those responsible are finally removed from office!“, Hoeke added.
Whether it is because of acts of violence by foreigners or other factors, but the polls ahead of the elections in Thuringia and also in Saxony, which will be held this Sunday, show that all three parties in the government now in Germany's coalition is struggling to win enough votes to overcome the 5 percent threshold needed to enter provincial parliaments, according to Politico.
Germany has seen an increase in knife attacks in recent months, sparking a national debate over tighter security controls and knife-free zones. About 430 such attacks took place in the first half of 2024, federal police data show.
The extent to which the fears of the rise of the far-right AzG are real will be evident in the upcoming elections. In addition to the vote on September 1 in Saxony and Thuringia, and on September 22 the residents of Brandenburg will vote. However, the actual actions of the government in Berlin may contribute to allaying these concerns.