Saxony’s Interior Minister in Berlin
Schuster calls for a deportation initiative for intensive offenders
April 10, 2024, 6:24 p.m
In a current hour, the Bundestag is debating the new police crime statistics. The Union added Saxony’s Interior Minister Schuster to the list of speakers. He calls on the government to take action against intensive offenders.
The Saxon Interior Minister Armin Schuster has called for the rapid deportation of foreign multiple and intensive offenders. “We need an immediate program for multiple and intensive offenders,” said the CDU politician in the Bundestag, where the Union parliamentary group had called a current hour on the new police crime statistics. One percent of Saxon non-German suspects commit 50 percent of the crimes, said Schuster.
“I would like to give you this one percent,” he said to Federal Interior Minister Nancy Faeser, who was following the debate from the government bench. He called on the SPD politician to create reception centers at airports in order to deport these perpetrators to their home countries. There are perpetrators in Saxony who have committed 20 to 25 crimes. “You must also be prepared to deport Mifas to Syria and Afghanistan,” said Schuster. “Mifa” is the abbreviation for multiple and intensive offenders. So far, Germany has not deported people to Afghanistan and Syria because these countries are not considered safe and those affected could face persecution from the Taliban or the Assad regime.
Schuster also called for an upper limit for the admission of refugees. He gave the figure of 100,000, which he described as a benchmark. In an interview with ntv.de last fall, he said that such a limit would result in the authorities trying to stay below it. “As a politician, when you set yourself a quantified goal, you also put yourself under pressure,” he said at the time. In the Bundestag, the Saxon Interior Minister also called for more refugees to be turned back at the border. Germany doesn’t have to stick to an “inefficient Dublin system,” he said. A new state parliament will be elected in Saxony on September 1, 2024.
Faeser presented the new police crime statistics on Tuesday together with BKA President Holger Münch and the Brandenburg Interior Minister Michael Stübgen. This shows an increase in overall crime of 5.5 percent and an increase in violent crime of 8.6 percent. What is noticeable is a sharp increase in foreign criminals of 17.8 percent. “What we are seeing now can no longer be explained solely by the catch-up effects of the Corona period,” said Münch in the ntv interview.
The increase in non-German suspects has to do with immigration. Since the proportion of non-Germans in the total population has increased, the number of suspects has also increased. “If you put that into context, then the increase among non-Germans is about as great as among Germans,” explained Münch. The proportion of non-German suspects is 37 percent. “That’s an enormously high number, we’ve never had such a high number before.”
In the debate in the Bundestag, speakers from the SPD and the Greens pointed out, among other things, that the statistics only list suspects, not those convicted. The Union called for greater support for the police and accused the government of trivializing the problem. Germany has been becoming less safe for two years, said CSU politician Andrea Lindholz. SPD MP Peggy Schierenbeck replied that there would be around 500,000 fewer crimes in 2023 than in 2016. “Action is being taken and the principle applies here too: zero tolerance.”