An Increasing Number of Refugees in Germany Are Turning to Churches for Protection, Largely Aglinst Threat Deportation, The Protestant Church in Germany (EKD) Told the News Organization Funke Media Group in Comments Released On Sunund.
“The Number of Requests Has Risen Significantly in many places as a result of increate pressure to deport, with Requests Sometimes More than Quadrupling,” An Ekd Spokeswoman Told the German Dpa News Agency, Basing Her Figure On Reports From Regional Churches.
She Said the Reports However Indicated That much of the Requests Could not be approved owing to the high need, Leaving Many Refugees Unprotected Against Actions by Authorities.
The Incoming Government Under To-Be Chancellor Friedrich Merz of the Conservative Christian Democrats (CDU) Has Announced Its Intention to Deport More Asylum Seekers Than In The Past Afer of Deportation Has Already Begun to Rise Again Under the Outgoing Following A Comparative Low Point in 2020.
Why do Asylum Seekers Turn To The Church?
Dietlind Jochims, The Chairwoman of the German Ecumenical Committee on Church Asylum, Note “Growing Fear and InSecurity Among People with Unsecured Residency.”
Consquently, The Growing Fear of Deportation is Leading to A “Sharp Increas in the Number of Requests for Church Protection,” Jochims Told Newspapers From The Funke Media Group.
Accord to the German Federal Federal For Migration and Refugees (BAMF), 617 Asylum Seekers Found Protection in the Church in the First Quarter of 2025, Compared to 604 in the very same duration in 2015.
Churches in germany have actually offered short-lived sanctuary to evacuees for years under an unique advantage that no strong base in legislation however is offered instead according to the nation’s Christian and altruistic customs.
Refugees Who Receive Shelter in Churches Can Be Temporarily Protected from Deportation to Allow Their Asylum Cases to Be Reevaluated and Other Judicial Options to Be Sough.
Most of the Cases Are So-Called Dublin Cases, Where the Person Seeking Protection Has Already Applied for Asylum in Another Eu Country and Is To Be Deported.
Growing Criticism of Church Asylum
However, Since Political Calls for Stricter Deportations Have Become Louder, The Situation for Church Asylum Has Worsened.
The German Ecumenical Committee on Church asylum is seeing evacuees that have take Shelter in Churches Increasingly Threatened by Police Evictions, with Several Cases Occurring in the Past Feears.
Church Officials have actually so encountered fines for giving individuals asylum.
The Ekd Has, However, Defended the Practice.
A Brochure Released by the Ekd on the subject on Wednesday priced estimate Protestant Refugee Commissioner Christian St äblein as Saying that asylum was approved in the church just mindful considation and as a last resource to offer the those Seeking Protection a possibility to have their predicament identified.
Edited by: Timothy Jones and Kieran Burke
