SPD leader attacks Merkel for U-turn on refugee policy

Germany’s Social Democrat (SPD) leader Sigmar Gabriel has accused Chancellor Angela Merkel of performing a “180-degree turn” on refugee policy as the Bundestag voted to block asylum claims from northern Africa.

Mr Gabriel, deputy chancellor in Dr Merkel’s grand coalition, also said it would be “unacceptable” if Europe lifted visa restrictions for Turkish citizens as part of a refugee deal without Turkey delivering on pre-conditions.

The attacks increase pressure on the German leader, who has refused to admit a shift from last year’s refugee crisis strategy that saw about one million asylum seekers arrive in Germany last year.

Among that number were 26,000 people from northern Africa, but Germany’s initial welcome has cooled after north African men were linked to New Year’s Eve assaults in Cologne.

Hard line

Now the German leader, who criticised Austria for closing their borders to shut down the so-called Balkan Route, faces claims she has benefited from those actions while now adopting a similar hard line.

"If you don't mind me saying so, that is a 180-degree turn," Mr Gabriel told Der Spiegel. The EU refugee swap arrangement with Turkey is particularly controversial and has been dubbed a "dirty deal" by opposition parties for relying on co-operation with an increasingly authoritarian Ankara administration.

Dr Merkel has defended the refugee swap deal as an effective answer to human trafficking. Some 350 people had drowned in the sea between Greece and Turkey before the deal, she said, and just seven since.

“We have to learn in Europe to protect our outer borders and decide ourselves who comes in,” Dr Merkel said. Despite the chancellor’s denials – or her deputy’s accusations – of a refugee policy U-turn, MPs voted yesterday to classify Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia as “safe countries of origin”, cutting the odds of their citizens’ asylum applications being successful.

“Being able to say no is also part of helping,” said federal interior minister Thomas de Maizière. A critic of Dr Merkel’s policy, he said many migrants were not fleeing persecution but the promise of “benefits better than they might be in their home country”.

Earlier this week he performed a U-turn of his own, extending checks on Germany’s borders a month after suggesting he would lift them in May.

In November the number of migrants arriving in Germany was 200,000, but that number has dropped continuously and was 16,000 in April. Even with tighter rules for northern African countries, Berlin said there would still be a chance for asylum for people from those countries if they show “persecution which diverges from the general political situation in their homeland”.

Opposition politicians attacked the new rules, saying persecution of minorities was commonplace in northern African countries