News / Germany

Syrian, Iraqi refugees to return home after crises: Germany's Merkel

Saturday, 30 January 2016 4:37 PM [ Last Update: Saturday, 30 January 2016 4:40 PM ]

German Chancellor Angela Merkel (AP photo)

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has defended her open-door refugee policy, arguing that asylum seekers from Syria and Iraq would go back home once the conflicts there end.

Addressing a meeting of her Christian Democratic Union (CDU) in the state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania on Saturday, Merkel said that despite efforts to integrate refugees and help them, it is important to stress that they have only been given permission to stay for a limited period of time.

“We need ... to say to people that this is a temporary residential status and we expect that once there is peace in Syria again, once IS (Daesh) has been defeated in Iraq, that you go back to your home country with the knowledge that you have gained,” she said.

Merkel has come under huge pressure over her policy on refugees. She has resisted calls from some conservatives to impose a cap on the influx of asylum seekers or close Germany's borders.

On January 26, Horst Seehofer, the Bavarian state premier and leader of the Christian Social Union (CSU), the sister party to Merkel’s CDU, threatened to contest the chancellor’s refugee policy in front of Germany’s constitutional court unless she agreed to change course.

Bavaria is the main entry point to Germany for refugees. Some 1.1 million refugees entered the country in 2015 alone.

Merkel has pledged to “measurably reduce” arrivals in 2016, but has refused to introduce a cap, saying it would be impossible to enforce it without closing German borders.

Instead, she has tried to convince other European nations to take in quotas of refugees, has pushed for reception centers to be built on Europe’s external borders, and led a European Union campaign to persuade Turkey to keep refugees from entering the continent. But progress has been slow.

Europe is facing an unprecedented influx of refugees who are fleeing conflict-ridden zones in Africa and the Middle East, particularly Syria.

Many blame major European powers for the unprecedented exodus, saying their policies have led to a surge in terrorism and war in those regions, forcing more people to flee their homes.

More than one million refugees reached Europe’s shores in 2015, while over 3,700 people either died or went missing in their perilous journey into the continent, according to figures released by the International Organization for Migration (IOM).

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