- Germany and five other EU countries agreed on strict new asylum policy goals at a summit on July 18, held at Germany's Zugspitze mountain, including plans to resume deportations to Afghanistan and Syria.
- The deal includes deportations to conflict zones, third-country asylum processing, visa restrictions for uncooperative countries, increased use of drones and expanded EU funding for border enforcement.
- On the same day, Germany deported 81 Afghan nationals convicted of serious crimes – the first such flight since 2024 and only the second since the Taliban takeover in 2021.
- The move follows rising domestic tensions and violent incidents involving rejected asylum seekers, prompting Chancellor Friedrich Merz's government to adopt a harder stance on migration.
- Austria has already resumed deportations to Syria and the full EU bloc will debate the proposals further at a Justice and Home Affairs meeting in Copenhagen this week.
Germany and five other EU nations have agreed to a set of stringent asylum policy goals, including controversial plans to resume deportations to Afghanistan and Syria.
During a high-level summit held at Germany’s highest mountain, the Zugspitze, on Friday, July 18, German Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt, along with interior ministers from France, Poland, Austria, the Czech Republic, Denmark and EU Home Affairs Commissioner Magnus Brunner, agreed to a set of stringent asylum policy goals.
The new policy proposals, which must still be approved by EU authorities in Brussels, include plans to resume deportations to conflict zones such as Afghanistan and Syria; remove legal barriers to transferring rejected asylum seekers to third-country processing centers; expedite the rejection of asylum claims from migrants already granted protection elsewhere in the EU; impose visa restrictions on countries that refuse to accept deported nationals; leverage trade and development aid to enhance cooperation on returns; expand the use of drones and increase EU funding for border infrastructure and personnel and crack down on human smuggling and trafficking networks. (Related: German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser announces reassessment of Syrian refugee protection status.)
"We are all concerned that the overburdening of our countries by illegal migration is also contributing massively to the polarization of society. We want to push back this polarisation," Dobrindt said.
This week, the debate is set to continue as the full 27-member bloc gathers in Copenhagen for an informal Justice and Home Affairs meeting.
Germany resumes deportations to Afghanistan after four-year hiatus
The declaration coincided with Germany's first deportation to Taliban-ruled Afghanistan since 2024 – a group of convicted criminals forcibly returned under the new government led by Chancellor Friedrich Merz.
That same day, Germany deported 81 Afghan nationals convicted of serious crimes to Afghanistan, marking the country's first such operation since 2024 and only the second since the Taliban seized control in 2021.
The deportation flight departed from Leipzig early Friday morning and was carried out with logistical assistance from Qatar, due to Germany's lack of formal diplomatic relations with the Taliban. The individuals aboard the flight were all rejected asylum-seekers who had been convicted of violent or otherwise serious offenses in Germany.
"We have included plans for such an approach in our coalition treaty, and it has now been completed for the first time today," he told journalists at a press conference on Friday.
The deportation policy is part of a broader push by Merz's Christian Democrats (CDU) and Dobrindt's Christian Social Union (CSU) to expand deportations, including to conflict zones like Afghanistan and Syria. The CDU/CSU bloc has pushed for stricter asylum laws following a series of violent incidents involving rejected asylum seekers earlier this year, which intensified debate in the run-up to Germany’s national elections in February.
That push is being mirrored in other parts of Europe. Austria recently became the first EU member state to resume deportations to Syria, following the fall of the Assad regime and the rise of a rebel-led government in Damascus late in 2024.
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