BERLIN — For the first time since the Taliban took power, Germany deported Afghan criminals back to their home country on a charter jet Friday morning, Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s spokesperson said.
“Germany’s security interests clearly outweigh the protection interests of criminals,” the spokesperson said.
Flight trackers showed a Qatar Airways Boeing 787 taking off from Leipzig for Kabul shortly before 7 a.m.
The operation was prepared by the German Chancellery and the Ministry of the Interior for two months. The 28 deportees were brought to Leipzig overnight from detention centers, received €1,000 in cash and were accompanied by a doctor, according to a report by the German newspaper Spiegel.
The German government initiated the deportations using Qatar as an intermediary, the report added. Scholz’s coalition had always ruled out direct negotiations with the Taliban regime.
Deportations of criminals from Germany to Afghanistan and Syria have been called for more frequently in recent weeks, as the migration debate roils Germany again. In summer 2021, Germany halted all deportations to Afghanistan due to the security situation as U.S. forces pulled out of the country after 20 years while the Taliban swept back to power.
The flight to Kabul comes just a few days after a Syrian suspected Islamic State terrorist — whose transfer under the EU’s Dublin Regulation to Bulgaria failed because he was not found on time — was arrested over the killing of three people with a knife in the German city of Solingen.
The German government also announced a tougher migration policy Thursday.
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