Germany has ways of making foreigne

[kurdeng at aps.nl]

Subject: Germany has ways of making foreigners leave


Germany has ways of making foreigners leave

Criminals face expulsion: Such warnings have been particularly aimed at Kurdish
separatists involved in violent protestsand attacks on property.

By Michael Anders

AFP Staff Writer
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BONN- The phased repatriation of 40,000 Vietnamese, which began Thursday,
illustrates German government determination to limit the number of foreigners
in the country by a variety of means.

The Vietnamese are to be gradually expelled between now and the year 2,000
under an agreement signed by the Bonn and Hanoi governments in July after more
than a year of negotiations. Previously, a treaty between Germany and Romania
in 1993 provided for the mass repatriation of tens of thousands of Romanians
who had flooded into the country with the collapse of the stalinist regimes of
eastern Europe.

But such bilateral accords pre-suppose that the governments concerned are
prepared to take their people back.

They generally require a financial "sweetener" or incentive representing aid
for the returnees and an undertaking not to prosecute the refugees for having
left their own country illegally.

With little prospect of being able in the near future to bring down an
unemployment level approaching 10 percent of the active population, the German
government is concerned not to exacerbate social problems related to the seven
million foreigners among a total population today of 81 million.

The sea-change came in 1993. Spurred by a terrifying wave of extreme rightwing
violence against hostels for refugees and the homes of foreigners reminiscent
of Nazi pogroms, members of Parliament voted a constitutional amendment
restricting a hitherto liberal right to asylum.

The restriction has had its desired effect, to the notable satisfaction of
Interior Minister Manfred Kanther and other rightwing members of Chancellor
Helmut Kohl's Christian Democratic Union (CDU): the number of asylum-seekers
plummeted from 322,599 in 1993 to 127,210 in 1994.

Despite the slim chances of having it granted, however, nearly 12,000 people
requested asylum in Germany this August alone, about 2,500 of them from
ex-Yugoslavia. Of 14,771 cases ruled upon the same month, only 9.6 percent were
accepted.

Kanther and Kohl have also made clear that foreigners who commit criminal
offenses on German soil can expect to be expelled. Such warnings have been
particularly aimed at the numerous Kurdish separatists involved in violent
demonstrations or attacks on property.

Of the 1.85 million Turks in Germany, about 400,000 are Kurds.

Likewise for the Vietnamese in Germany: those involved in illegal activities
are priority cases for expulsion under the bilateral accord, which is also
aimed against any future attempts at illegal immigration.

Of 1,400 Vietnamese who requested asylum in Germany in the first six months of
1995, the number granted refugee status was "nearly nil," according to the
interior minister.

Another discouragement for would-be immigrants is the difficulty for foreigners
in obtaining German nationality.

The Free Democrats and the opposition Social Democrats (SPD) have wanted the
rules made easier, but the Christian Union parties have so far resisted this.

The new asylum law came under the spotlight last week when Kanther ordered the
repatriation of seven Sudanese immediately their final legal recourse to the
Constitutional Court failed, despite an expected offer by Eritrea to accept
them.

Although the SPD had voted with the government to tighten the asylum law, which
left wing militants and humanitarian activists at the time considered a bitter
betrayal, SPD vice-president Herta Daeubler-Gmelin called at the weekend for a
review of how it was working.

But after Stern magazine reported that the claims of the seven Sudanese to be
escaping political persecution were fake, a Green party move to put the
interior minister on the spot crumbled Wednesday and the SPD was silent.

The German authorities also deny closing the doors to those refugees closest to
hand: they say Germany has taken in some 400,000 people fleeing the fighting in
ex-Yugoslavia, more than twice that of all the other European Union countries
put together. Here too, however, bilateral repatriation agreements have come
into play. On September 1, it was agreed that Germany this month resume sending
back Croatian refugees numbering as many as 40,000.
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Germany resumes aid to Turkey

Turkish Daily News
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ANKARA- Germany decided on Wednesday to resume its military aid to Turkey,
which had been suspended in March in protest over Ankara's military incursions
into northern Iraq trying to flush out militants of the outlawed Kurdistan
Workers' Party (PKK). The resumption was signalled by a finance commission of
the Bundestag, or lower house of parliament, which voted to provide 150 million
marks ($100 million) in aid to allow Turkey to buy two frigates.

In addition to this, the German government will provide 100 million marks worth
of military equipment as "grants," German ambassador to Ankara, Dr.
Hans-Joachim Vergau, said on Wednesday in a press conference.

Vergau said that the decision had long been in the pipeline, but the
bureaucratic formalities had taken time. Germany had suspended its aid in
response to major Turkish military incursions into Iraq to crush PKK militants.
Turkey, on its side, accused Germany of turning its back on a NATO partner in
its hour of need and insisted it was well within its rights to use military
force to quell what it described as a "terrorist threat."

"Please allow me to remind you one more time that Germany, which hosts about 2
million Turkish citizens, suffers the effects of conflicts within Turkey. For
this reason, Germany, more than any other country, has the right to expect
solutions that go beyond pure military measures ... Having said that, there is
no doubt that we support Turkey's determined fight against terrorism," Dr.
Vergau said.

Wednesday's decision was expected to attract strong criticism from the
opposition Social Democrats, the Green Party and the formerly communist Party
of Democratic Socialism.

The Greens said that the suspension should have been extended given the
political instability in Turkey.

The decision came on the same day that Prime Minister Tansu Ciller resigned in
Ankara due to a quarrel with a junior coalition partner in her government.

Ankara welcomes the release

Ankara welcomed the German decision Thursday. "We consider this decision of the
German Parliament and government to be a step in the right direction," Foreign
Ministry deputy spokesman Nurettin Nurkan said. "We believe that this problem,
which stemmed from a misunderstanding and cast a shadow on Turco-German
frienship and cooperation, is solved."