Afghanistan deportation stop: Seehofer's U

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Federal Minister of the Interior Horst Seehofer (CSU)

Photo: Jens Schicke / imago images / Jens Schicke

Federal Interior Minister Horst Seehofer (CSU) is currently on vacation, in his holiday home in the Altmühltal, where he almost always spends his vacation.

On Wednesday around noon he called his ministry in Berlin and consulted with his experts and his press officer.

A short time later, at 1:31 pm, the German press agency sent an urgent report: "Germany is suspending deportations to Afghanistan."

What happened in the 20 minutes?

A sudden change of heart on the part of the minister?

A word of power from the Chancellor?

Neither, says Horst Seehofer on the phone, sometimes as a politically responsible person you just have to dig in between.

He had read the first report, the agency had referred to a statement by his spokesman in the federal press conference: "The BMI continues to believe that there are people in Germany who should leave the country - as soon as possible." One line which the ministry has represented for some time and which, in view of the rapid conquest of the Taliban in Afghanistan, has been increasingly criticized - by the opposition, the coalition partner SPD, by experts and aid organizations.

Responsibility for life and limb

Another sentence, which was also in this report, was largely ignored: Deportations would only take place, the spokesman had said, if, after an individual examination, they were deemed "justifiable" and the security situation in the destination country was "calculable".

This is exactly what, says Seehofer, the security situation is definitely no longer.

As the executive minister, he is not only responsible for the life and limb of those being deported, but also for the accompanying staff, the police officers, administrative officials, doctors, interpreters and flight attendants.

There would be an average of three companions for one deportee.

With his clarification, Seehofer ended a hang-up that lasted for days.

For eight days there had been highly contradicting statements about the attitude of the federal government to deportations to Afghanistan.

Last week, on Tuesday evening at 9:30 p.m., a deportation pilot was supposed to take off from Munich for Afghanistan.

Six offenders from North Rhine-Westphalia, Bavaria and Baden-Württemberg were already on board the charter plane.

But in Kabul the Taliban had carried out an attack on a guest house belonging to the Afghan Defense Minister.

Because the situation was confusing and the safety of the crew and those being deported could not be guaranteed, the Federal Ministry of the Interior canceled the repatriation.

At the time, however, Seehofer insisted that the deportation campaign should be rescheduled "promptly" - preferably in August.

Kabul may be conquered

Together with five ministerial colleagues from Austria, Denmark, the Netherlands, Belgium and Greece, the CSU interior minister also wrote a letter to the EU Commission. The politicians insisted on being able to deport rejected asylum seekers - especially criminals - to Afghanistan. A complete stop would send the wrong signal and ensure that even more migrants make their way to Europe, argued the ministers. They refused to accept a request made by the Afghan government in July to refrain from repatriation for a few months because of the tense security situation.

But in Afghanistan the situation worsened every day.

The Taliban have now captured nine provincial capitals.

According to the Washington Post, US secret services suspect that the capital Kabul could fall into the hands of the Islamists in 30 to 90 days.

On Tuesday, all eight ambassadors of the EU states who currently have missions abroad in Kabul sent a fire letter to the member states - and urgently recommended that forced returns to Afghanistan be suspended.

The letter was also signed by the German head of mission in Kabul.

It was an extremely unusual step and was in clear contradiction to the attitude of the five interior ministers revealed in the letter.

Seehofer keeps a window open

This letter from the interior minister, Seehofer says today, had a lead time.

The letter was above all a call to the EU Commission to finally take care of the foreign policy challenges of the refugee movements.

The extreme situation of today was not yet recognizable when the letter was written.

However, Seehofer wants to keep one window open with his decision to stop deportation.

"As soon as the situation allows, criminals and threats will be deported back to Afghanistan," he said on Wednesday.

It is questionable whether this will happen during his time as Minister of the Interior.

After the election in autumn, Seehofer stopped politics after 50 years.