There are rumblings at the Green grassroots. The reason for this is a possible adaptation of EU asylum law. In a letter obtained by our editors, 730 members write to the party leadership.
Berlin – "Dear Annalena. Dear Robert. Dear Lisa. Dear Ricarda. Dear Omid. Dear Catherine. Dear Britta." This is how a letter from the Green Party base to the party leadership begins. In it, around 730 party members criticize the plans for asylum reform – and openly attack their own leadership. The letter is available to our editors. Previously, Der Spiegel had reported.
Letter to Green Party leaders: "German negotiating position difficult to understand"
Specifically, the signatories complain, among other things, of a course of "deterrence and isolation" as well as plans for a "massive curtailment of the right of asylum". According to the letter, the EU proposals are primarily aimed at "reducing the number of people who can flee to Europe and Germany". "Yet tightening of asylum laws, deterrence and isolation have shown in the past that they do not lead to fewer refugees, but only to more suffering."
According to the signatories, the EU Commission's plans for asylum reform are "nowhere near covered" by the coalition agreement of the traffic light coalition of SPD, Greens and FDP. Thus, the "German negotiating position" on this point is "difficult to understand," the letter says. The signatories "do not expect the difficult situation in European asylum policy to change overnight". However, the Green Party leadership should help "to ensure that populism is not cast into law" and that its own party regains "hegemony in the debate".
Refugees reach the island of Lesbos in a rubber dinghy. If the EU has its way, there could soon be new rules at the external borders. © Aris Messinis/AFP//Michael Kappeler/picture alliance/dpa (montage)
Asylum debate: "I would like to see a different style from the coalition"
Since Friday, around 730 people have signed the letter. One of them is the parliamentary group leader in the Thuringian state parliament, Astrid Rothe-Beinlich. In an interview with Merkur.de, she criticises the situation at the EU's external borders, for example on the Greek islands or in Turkey. Rothe-Beinlich emphasizes the "fundamental right to asylum" and sees not only her own party as responsible. "I would like to see a different style from the coalition as a whole."
Timon Dzienus, co-leader of the Green Youth, also put his name under the letter. He also criticizes the asylum policy at the EU's external borders and sees a "clear contradiction" in the position of the German government and the coalition agreement, as Dzienus tells us in an interview with our editors. The letter is intended to promote a humanitarian refugee policy.
The addressees of the letter are the Green ministers Annalena Baerbock (foreign affairs), Robert Habeck (economy) and Lisa Paus (family) as well as the party leaders Ricarda Lang and Omid Nouripour and the Green parliamentary group chairmen in the Bundestag, Katharina Dröge and Britta Haßelmann.
Asylum law: EU summit on Thursday
On Thursday, 8 June, EU interior ministers will discuss the reform of the European asylum system. According to the will of Federal Interior Minister Nancy Faeser (SPD), the federal government should, among other things, advocate that asylum centres be set up at the EU's external borders in order to make a preliminary examination of the asylum applications of many people there. The detention of children and adolescents in asylum centres outside Europe is also being discussed. Above all, there was encouragement for this proposal from the FDP.
Meanwhile, the Green Party base is calling on its party leadership to break "new ground". The letter ends with an appeal: "Stand up for a reform that improves the situation and prevents the current attack on the right of asylum in Brussels from being successful." (as)
