Luxembourg refuses asylum seekers turned away at German border

Germany on Friday turned away four asylum seekers from Afghanistan who tried entering the country from Luxembourg, but the Grand Duchy has previously said it would not take back individuals refused entry.

Germany had announced stricter border controls after its new government took office last week. The four people turned away – two women and two men – had previously applied for asylum in Greece, said Stefan Döhn, spokesman for the German Federal Police in Trier.

The four people were discovered at Trier main station during a check of a coach. They were turned back in consultation with the police in Luxembourg, said Döhn.

However, Luxembourg Home Affairs Minister Léon Gloden told RTL that police from the Grand Duchy had not been informed, repeating previous remarks that the country would not take people back. “If someone has been turned away at the border at this point in time, we will not take them in,” he previously said in an interview with the Tageblatt newspaper.

Döhn told the Trierischer Volksfreund newspaper that Luxembourg authorities would be informed about any rejected asylum seekers but that colleagues across the border would not have to be present to receive them back. Anyone crossing the border into Germany illegally will be taken from the check point on the A64 motorway to the border bridge in Wasserbillig, Döhn said.

If no Luxembourg authorities are there to greet them, they will be asked to cross on foot. Döhn could not say what would happen if the person then tried entering Germany again.

Léon Gloden, Luxembourg’s home affairs minister, sought dialogue with his German counterpart on the subject of border controls last week.  © Photo credit: Anouk Antony

Federal police still waiting for ‘clear instructions’

A few hours after taking office last week, German Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt announced that asylum seekers could also be turned back at the border in future. Pregnant women, children and members of other vulnerable groups would not be turned back, he said, but added that the move would reduce numbers and send a “signal to the world and to Europe [that] the police in Germany has changed.”

In the coalition agreement between the CDU, CSU and SPD, the new German government agreed: “In coordination with our European neighbours, we will also carry out rejections at our common borders for asylum applications.”

This could potentially violate EU rules and the Dublin agreement, under which asylum seekers can be returned to the country where they first requested asylum but not the country they last came from.

The German police union (GdP) called for legal clarity following Dobrindt’s announcement on so-called refoulement, or forcibly returning asyslum seekers to a jurisdiction where they may face danger. “So far, we have no clear instructions on how we should proceed differently. That is why we are still proceeding as before at the moment,” Andreas Roßkopf, chairman of the Federal Police, told Die Welt.

(This article was first published by the Luxemburger Wort. Translated using AI, edited by Aaron Grunwald.)

Source: With reporting from DPA news agency