Chancellor Friedrich Merz said on Monday that Germany plans to deport Syrian citizens with criminal records and has invited Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa to Berlin for talks on the issue.
"We will, of course, continue to deport criminals to Syria. That is the plan. We will now implement this in a very concrete manner," Merz told reporters.
He added that Germany also wants to contribute to Syria’s stability and intends to discuss with al-Sharaa "how we can solve this together".
Merz’s stance marks a sharp departure from the policy of his predecessor, Angela Merkel, whose government adopted an open-door approach a decade ago, allowing around one million refugees, many of them Syrians, to enter Germany during the conflict.
Since then, the rise of the far right has pushed Merz’s conservative CDU party to take a tougher position on migration and border security, with an emphasis on speeding up deportations.
"I will say it again: the civil war in Syria is over. There are now no longer any grounds for asylum in Germany," Merz said.
President al-Sharaa, who took power from Bashar al-Assad in December 2024, has embarked on several diplomatic visits aimed at restoring Syria’s international relations after years of isolation. He is expected to visit Washington in early November.
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Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has met Syria’s new leader, Ahmed al-Sharaa, in Damascus in a visit that underscores Kyiv’s push to strengthen military ties across the Middle East and promote its military expertise following the outbreak of the U.S.-Israel war on Iran.
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A man previously convicted of spying on Türkiye has been arrested by Turkish and Syrian authorities after more than a decade on the run, Turkish security sources said on Monday.
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U.S. Vice-President J.D. Vance began a visit to Budapest on Tuesday by praising Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, who faces a closely contested parliamentary election on Sunday.
A gunfight with police outside the Israeli consulate in Istanbul’s Beşiktaş district left at least one attacker dead and two others injured, according to Turkish authorities, prompting a major police response on Tuesday (7 April).
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