However, it is unfortunate that while the EU condones German border control, it condemns our country for the same reason. Written by Zoltán Lomnici Jr.
The introduction of internal border controls in Germany clearly indicates that the protection of external borders was not sufficient to address public security challenges. The German government's decision to introduce temporary border controls at all its land borders may indicate that there is a link between illegal migration and the threat of terrorism. As Secretary of the Interior Nancy Faeser stated, "We are strengthening homeland security and continuing to crack down on illegal immigration."
However, analysts and politicians also consider it backwards that the EU condones German border control, and that our country is also condemned for protecting our borders.
"It is not right for the EU to condemn Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, who opposes Brussels' migration policy, while the introduction of German border controls is condoned by the EU bodies"
said Polish EP representative Bartlomiej Sienkiewicz.
Based on Article 25 of the Schengen Border Control Code, temporary border control at internal borders is allowed to be reinstated if there is a serious threat to public order or internal security in a Member State that justifies this exceptional measure. This legal basis serves to legitimize the current German border control measure.
According to information from the security services, the German authorities now have 483 Islamist threats in Germany. The Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV) counts a total of 27,480 people who reported a so-called Islamism potential in 2022 (this is 2.9 percent less than the 28,290 people in 2021). The largest proportion are of Salafist aspirations (11,000). The BfV has no reliable data on the Islamic State and Al-Qaeda in Germany.
According to the 2021 Europol report on the state of terrorism, a total of 57 attempted terrorist attacks were registered in the EU27 in 2020, including successful, prevented and unsuccessful attacks, while in 2019 this number was 55 (in 2019 10 people lost their lives and 27 were injured as a result of the terrorist attack).
In 2020, 10 jihadist attacks were reported in Austria, France and Germany; although jihadists carried out only one-sixth of the attacks, they were responsible for more than half of the deaths (12) and almost all of the injuries (47). Jihadi Islamic extremists are therefore responsible for the terrorist attacks most likely to result in deaths.
In 2009, 4.2 million, 4.5 million in 2015, and 5.5 million people with a Muslim background lived in Germany with a population of more than 80 million in 2020. According to RIAS, the organization that has been monitoring anti-Semitic incidents in Germany since 2017, the number of anti-Semitic incidents increased by more than 80 percent in 2023: a total of 4,782 such incidents were registered, which is the most in a single year so far. Among the incidents, there were also 7 cases defined by RIAS as "extreme violence", i.e. attacks that could have taken life - for example, an attack on a synagogue in Berlin, when a perpetrator threw Molotov cocktails at the building.
Foreigners who do not appear in the German population statistics ("missing") as a security risk:
The population of Germany was 82.7 million according to the 2022 census data published this year, 1.4 million fewer than previously assumed, this deficit was particularly noticeable in the case of the foreign population
- announced the German Federal Statistical Office.
There are several indications that voters were satisfied with the series of violent crimes committed by people with a migration background, as well as the pro-migration attitude of the government, the latter of which is clearly demonstrated by the results of the provincial elections in September. On September 1, 2024, elections were held in two states: in Saxony, the anti-immigration, radical right-wing AfD came in second, 1.3 percent behind the CDU (31.9 to 30.6), and in Thuringia, a towering 32.8 percentage, the AfD won (2nd was the CDU with 23.6 percent).
Featured image: jr. Zoltán Lomnici / Photo: hirado.hu
