Deutsche Welle: Why there will be no Afghan refugee flows – Researcher explains

There are many images of despair from Kabul airport that have traveled around the world in recent days. In one of the videos we watched hundreds of men running next to a US Air Force aircraft. Some tried to cling and then fell into the void.

“What we are seeing here is the despair of those who fear the Taliban and find no way out,” said immigration expert Gerald Knaus in an interview with Deutsche Welle.

“This development is bitter, dramatic and terrible, especially for the people of Afghanistan,” said Chancellor Angela Merkel. He admits he misjudged the situation for a long time. Angela Merkel also clarifies that the German government does not plan to accept a large number of refugees in Germany. “Our main goal is to provide perspective to those who have helped us directly,” he explains. He would like to help some 10,000 German Air Force assistants and their relatives flee Afghanistan. Germany is also keen to offer quick support to Afghanistan’s neighboring refugee-receiving states.

However, immigration researcher Gerald Knaus doubts whether mass movements of people from Afghanistan will begin. Kabul is under their complete domination Taliban, who have set up checkpoints everywhere. They also control all the external borders of the country: “The idea that a very large number of Afghans will leave is not practical. This is not possible at the moment “.

Millions of Afghans have already fled

The UN recorded about 2.6 million Afghan refugees at the end of 2020. 1.4 million live in neighboring Pakistan. How many of the estimated 38 million Afghans could escape in the near future? Unknown, says Gerald Knaus.

Could the 2015/16 refugee drama be repeated? This issue will be on the agenda of today’s election campaign. At that time, more than a million people came to Germany. Many of them were Syrians. The issue dominated and polarized public debate in Germany for a long time.

“Refugees are already an issue in the election campaign,” political scientist Klaus Steve of the University of Eichstet Inglostat said in an interview with DW. “If the number of refugees increases, which is likely, the situation will change. “Political polarization will increase.” But almost everyone agrees that the Afghan workers who helped the German army and German organizations should now be helped quickly. “But that’s where the unanimity ends,” Steve believes.

“We must not repeat the mistakes of 2015,” said Christian Union candidate for chancellor Armin Lasset, indirectly distancing himself from Chancellor Angela Merkel, who had kept the German border open at the time. SPD Chancellor Olaf Solz does not want to commit to a certain number of people who could be admitted to Germany.

The Germans are worried

The Greens are more open to membership. We should not expect, they argue, that all 27 EU countries will reach an agreement, but we should work with those countries that are ready to accept refugees, said the candidate for Chancellor of the Greens, Annalena Berbock. As for the Alternative for Germany, it has already called for “the suspension of the right to asylum and the strengthening of border protection”.

A recent Civey Institute survey for the Augsburger Allgemeine newspaper showed that the majority of Germans fear a situation similar to that of 2015/16. Nearly two-thirds (62.9%) fear that many refugees from Afghanistan could come to the country.

However, political scientists Steve, Knaus and Deer Sarai agree that the comparison with 2015 is wrong. “Back then, the Turks did not require visas for the Syrians. “Anyone could leave and suddenly be in the EU,” said Gerald Knaus, and Klaus Steve added that “Germany is much better prepared today.”