Nigerian activists protesting in Dresden at an event organised by the Voice Refugees Forum, 2019. According to the information of the Network Refugees4Refugees, a migrant support group, 27 persons were deported to Lagos on 24 August 2021, the latest deportation to Nigeria this year. Nigeria is one of the major deportation destination in Africa/ Photo: Osaren Igbinoba

Deportations from Germany on the rise again

The number of deportations from Germany has increased again after an initially significant decline in the Corona pandemic. In the first six months of this year, 5,688 people were deported from Germany, compared to 4,616 in the first half of 2020, according to information of the Federal Ministry of the Interior. The ministry provided the information in response to a question from the Left Party in the Bundestag.

According to the interior ministry, a total of 4,889 deportations were carried out by air, 735 by land and 64 by sea in the first half of this year. As in previous years, the most important airport for deportations was Frankfurt am Main, followed by Düsseldorf and Berlin-Brandenburg. Almost half of all deported persons (2,802) were returned to their countries of origin or to a third country by means of collective deportations.

The number of deportations had decreased massively since the beginning of the Corona pandemic in 2020, said the Left Party. Between 2015 and 2019, between 20,000 and 25,000 people were sent back from Germany to their countries of origin or other EU countries every year. With the pandemic, many countries had stopped air traffic and closed borders. This also had an impact on deportations from Germany.

Ulla Jelpke, the interior affairs expert of the Left Party, called for an “end to this cynical policy and a fundamental rethink: an end to deportations to war, lack of prospects and misery, for an effective right to stay [for those affected]”.

Sola Jolaoso

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