Denied deployment in Ukraine
Germany grants asylum to 90 Russians
September 23, 2023, 4:11 p.m
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In order to avoid military service, around 3,500 Russian men are hoping for protection from Berlin. However, the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees only recognizes asylum status for a fraction of them. The Left thinks this is “grotesque” – and is calling for humanitarian visas.
Since the beginning of Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine, around 3,500 Russian men of military age have applied for asylum in Germany – but only 90 of them have so far received protection status. The Federal Office for Migration and Refugees (BAMF) has so far decided on more than 1,500 of the applications from Russia, according to a response from the Federal Ministry of the Interior to a parliamentary question from left-wing MP Clara Bünger.
For the majority of applications, around 1,100, another member state is responsible for carrying out the asylum procedure due to the Dublin regulation. The Federal Ministry of the Interior explained in response: “Current decision-making practice provides for the following: deserters may continue to receive international protection on a regular basis. In addition, people who are to be drafted into the army and refuse to serve will receive international protection, provided the conditions for this are met.”
The left-wing politician Bünger criticized the editorial network Germany: “The traffic light is good at promoting human rights and making well-sounding promises. However, there is a lack of implementation.” Compared to the hundreds of thousands of Russians “who are on the run because they do not want to take part in the war in Ukraine that violates international law,” the protection status for 90 people is a “grotesquely low number.”
Bünger demanded that the federal government must instruct the BAMF to provide Russian conscientious objectors with straightforward protection. “And it must, in consultation with other EU states, make humanitarian visas available so as not to abandon these people.”