Overview

• German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and the 16 state governors have agreed on new measures to curb migration to Germany, amid a 73% increase in asylum applications and overcrowded shelters. The new measures include accelerated asylum procedures, benefit restrictions for asylum-seekers, and more financial aid from the federal government for the states dealing with the influx.
• Scholz expressed the need to 'deport people faster', emphasizing that those who are not likely to be granted permission to stay in Germany because they cannot claim a need for protection must go back. To make this possible, measures such as increasing the reachability of public authorities around the clock and accelerating the digitalization of the Immigration Office have been proposed.
• Starting next year, the federal government will pay an annual lump sum of 7,500 euros for each asylum seeker instead of a total annual sum of around 3.7 billion euros. Asylum seekers are expected to receive at least part of their benefits as credit on a payment card, meaning they will get less cash in the future.
• Scholz rejected the idea of external processing of asylum requests, stating that the federal government will examine whether asylum procedures outside of the EU are possible. The idea of conducting asylum procedures outside of Germany to keep the migrants from arriving in the first place has been put forth by some state governors but did not pass.
• With the new measures, asylum procedures are to be processed faster than before, and asylum applications from people coming from countries with a recognition rate of less than 5% are to be completed within three months. The controls that Germany established at its borders with Switzerland, the Czech Republic, Poland and Austria are also set to be extended.