Migration: Refugees rescued from distress wait partly for months for transfer

Rescuers rescued from distress wait for months for the transfer to Germany. The duration of the procedure moves "so far between four weeks and three months", writes the Federal Ministry of the Interior in its answer to a request of the left-wing fraction, which is present to the news agency dpa. However, some of the migrants the Federal Republic of Italy took over had to wait almost eleven months.

Germany, France and other European countries regularly take in migrants rescued by aid agencies or state-owned vessels in the Mediterranean, arriving in Italy and Malta. According to the Ministry of the Interior, 227 people have arrived in Germany since June 2018 until October 15. Germany has promised to take over 679 migrants during the same period.

Distribution should take place within four weeks

The domestic spokeswoman for the left-wing group, Ulla Jelpke, criticized the waiting times. She also criticized that those affected must first apply for asylum in the country of arrival. Jelpke spoke of "bureaucratic harassment" and called for a faster procedure. "Protection seekers should be able to apply for asylum in an EU state of their choice, for example, with linguistic and personal ties."

By the end of September, Germany, France, Italy and Malta had agreed on an interim solution for the distribution of migrants rescued from the Mediterranean. (Read more here.) This also provides that the distribution in the future should be within four weeks. The necessary procedure will be voted on, wrote the Ministry of the Interior in its information of 24 October.

According to the Malta agreement, Germany also intends to continue to absorb about a quarter of those rescued on the way to Malta or Italy. This is to prevent people from being stuck on rescue ships for weeks at a time. Recently, however, the rescue vessel "Ocean Viking" with 104 migrants on board had to wait twelve days before it could run into an Italian port.