ROLE OF GERMANY IN THE REFUGEE CRISIS

Germany has always welcomed the Refugees with open arms. In the German Constitution, Article 16a of the Basic Law grants victims of immigration, an individual right of Asylum. Hence, the fundamental right of asylum has great priority and has expressed Germany’s willingness to satisfy her humanitarian and historical obligation to admit refugees. The procedure of admitting the Asylum seekers is there in the Asylum Procedure Act. The Asylum seekers who are permitted by the border authorities to enter Germany or the Federal Republic of Germany or those who are found in Germany without a permit for residence are transferred to the reception center nearest, to the relevant state.
Using the Initial Distribution, a nation-wide system of distribution, the seekers are assigned to reception centers of the individual states of Germany, as defined in the Asylum Procedure Act.
THE ASYLUM PROCESS IN GERMANY:
The Asylum application is submitted to the branch of the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees (BAMF) for examination and decision. Then the seekers receive a certificate of permission to reside which provides a primary right to stay in Germany during the procedure.  The seekers are personally questioned by the BAMF workers on their travel routes and reasons for persecution. The interview is then recorded in writing and translated in respective languages of the asylum seekers, a copy of which is also provided to the seekers. The decision on the application is based on these interviews and requires further investigations. The Asylum seekers are informed about the decision in writing and are given information on legal remedy.
If the application is accepted, then those granted the Asylum status and those granted the Refugee status are given a temporary residence permit and are given the same status as Germans within the system of Social Insurance. They are provided social welfare, child and child raising benefits, allowances for integration, language courses and other kinds of integration assistance.
If neither asylum nor refugee protection can be granted then the BAMF examines the procedure for asylum as to whether there are grounds for a deportation ban. This obligatory conduct of reviewing extensively is due to the intention to ensure that there is no delay in processing. However, according to the rule, the asylum seekers whose applications have not been accepted are required to leave the country.

* In August 2015, Germany announced that it was suspending Dublin for Syrian asylum seekers, which effectively stopped deportations of Syrians back to their European country of entry. This move by the bloc's largest and wealthiest member country was seen as an important gesture of solidarity with entry-point states. Most of the asylum claims are submitted in Germany, which already has well-established Diaspora communities from the Balkans.

Akshara Bhargava