Merkel: Refugees aren’t root of terrorism in Germany
August 18, 2016, 12:58 pm

Merkel has not closed the door on Syrian refugees despite criticism of her policies [Xinhua]

During an election campaign tour in Germany’s northeastern Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania state, Merkel told supporters that “the phenomenon of Islamist terrorism by IS isn’t a phenomenon that came to us with the refugees, it’s one that we had before too”.

Merkel and her refugee policy had come under attack even before a number of terrorism-related attacks this summer which killed and wounded dozens in different German cities.

Her political opponents say that allowing hundreds of thousands of (mostly Syrian) refugees in the country is a potential “Trojan Horse” which allows terrorists to infiltrate the country.

Others have pointed to the challenges of integrating these refugees and preventing disenfranchisement which plays into the hands of Islamic State recruiters.

On Wednesday, Merkel admitted that refugees are susceptible to such recruitment.

But other critics say the system of integration may already be over-stressed and unable to cope quickly and adequately enough with the huge numbers of refugees settling in Germany.

In the meantime, German authorities have boosted security measures in the wake of the attacks such as the suicide bombing and train ax attack in Bavaria. These come in tandem with modifications to immigration procedures which would allow deportation of those associated with IS and stripping citizenship from those who join extremist groups.

Merkel herself has suggested a ‘nine-point plan’ to increase security, which includes hiring more guards and security personnel and boosting anti-terrorism cooperation with other countries.

The refugee crisis came to the fore last year when hundreds of Iraqis, Syrians, Libyans, Afghans, Eritreans and others died crossing the Mediterranean in hopes of reaching Greek or Italian shores and then moving on into northern Europe.

European Union governments were particularly spurred to action when photos of dead children washed ashore made headlines in the global press.

Since January 1, more than 132,000 have crossed into Greece, but that number has significantly decreased after the EU worked out a deal with Turkey to take back tens of thousands of Syrian refugees in a bid thwart smugglers and dissuade others from making the dangerous journey across the Adriatic or Aegean.

Meeting what has been called the worst humanitarian crisis since World War Two, Germany said it would take up to 800,000 refugees this year.

The BRICS Post with inputs from Agencies