Germany deported 23 Afghan men to their country of origin on a charter flight early Tuesday, carrying out the latest repatriations despite criticism from opposition lawmakers and rights groups.
Germany’s Federal Ministry of the Interior said the majority of those deported are criminals who had been convicted of serious crimes, including sexual offences and assault.
Federal police officers accompanied the men on the flight from Leipzig/Halle Airport to Kabul, dpa learnt.
Following a deportation flight at the end of July, German Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt said returns to Afghanistan would no longer be limited exclusively to criminals and “individuals posing a threat.” Rather, as agreed in the coalition agreement, he said other individuals required to leave the country would also be deported with immediate effect.
In a post on the social media platform X, Dobrindt wrote that German society “has a clear interest in ensuring that criminals must leave” Germany. Furthermore, he added, anyone without a right of residence must expect to have to leave Germany. “We are consistently implementing this policy,” he added.
The government’s Afghanistan deportation policy has drawn criticism from opposition lawmakers and rights groups. Green Party lawmakers Schahina Gambir and Sara Nanni accused the government of kowtowing to Afghanistan’s Taliban – which has deprived women and girls of fundamental human rights – to achieve its goal of “deportations at any cost.”
By cooperating with the Taliban, the government is helping the Islamists to “become socially acceptable on the international stage,” the lawmakers said.
Germany does not recognize the Taliban, which retook power in Kabul five years ago, as a legitimate government. With support from Qatar, it organized its first mass deportation of Afghan criminals to their country of origin two years ago.
Afghanistan is facing a severe humanitarian crisis. The United Nations World Food Programme warned recently that malnutrition has reached unprecedented levels, while the UN’s International Labour Organization said only around 33% of the working-age population are in employment.
One of the 31 men deported from Germany at the end of July told dpa over the phone that he had arrived in Germany at the age of 14 and had partly forgotten his mother tongue, Dari.
He said the deportation had separated him from his wife and child. “There’s no work for me here in Kabul. If my older brother weren’t here, I’d be living on the streets,” he said, adding that he hopes to return to Germany.