President Bashar el-Assad fled Syria during the night from Saturday to Sunday, driven out by the spectacular offensive of a coalition of rebels, led by the Islamists of the HTC group. The end of half a century of unchallenged reign of the family clan… Which is already moving some lines in Europe. In a context of strong progress by far-right parties in recent elections on the continent, the German, British, Austrian, Swedish, Danish, Norwegian and Belgian governments have already decided to suspend asylum requests from Syrian nationals. France plans to do the same. This refugee status, defined by the Geneva Convention of 1951, recognizes as such any person fearing being persecuted in their country of origin “because of their race, their religion, their nationality, their belonging to a certain social group or their political opinions”.
In Germany, given the “current uncertainty”, the Federal Office for Immigration and Refugees has “decreed a freeze on decisions for asylum procedures currently still underway” for Syrian migrants, said this Monday in a press release from German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser. Germany is the European Union country with the largest Syrian diaspora. According to figures from the Ministry of the Interior, 974,136 people of Syrian nationality currently reside in the country. Of these, 5,090 were recognized as eligible for asylum, 321,444 were granted refugee status and 329,242 were granted subsidiary protection, a more temporary reprieve, while tens of thousands of other cases remain. outstanding.
“The end of the brutal tyranny of Syrian dictator Assad is a great relief for many people who have suffered torture, murder and terror,” said the minister. Many Syrians who have found refuge in Germany since the great migration crisis of 2015-2016 “now finally have the hope of returning to their Syrian homeland and rebuilding their country”, she added, stressing that the situation remains “very confused”, and that “the concrete possibilities of return are not yet predictable at the moment”.
In Denmark, the Danish Refugee Appeals Board also “decided to suspend the processing of cases concerning people from Syria due to the very uncertain situation in the country after the fall of the Assad regime”, she said. written in a press release. The decision currently concerns 69 cases. She also “decided to postpone the departure deadline for people able to be expelled to Syria”, which concerns 50 cases, she said.
France is also considering the suspension
In Norway, the Norwegian Directorate of Immigration (UDI) “will not reject or grant asylum applications from Syrians who have requested asylum, for the moment”, specifies the organization, without giving the number of files concerned. Norway has received 1,933 asylum applications from Syrians since the start of the year.
Sweden is also concerned. “Given the situation, it is simply not possible to assess the grounds for protection at present,” Carl Bexelius, head of legal affairs at the Swedish Migration Agency, said in a statement. The decision must be made official on Tuesday. A similar decision was also taken in the context of the Taliban takeover in Afghanistan in 2021. Sweden is the second EU country to have received the largest number of Syrians fleeing the civil war in 2015 and 2016, after Germany. The authorities will also suspend expulsions while waiting for the political situation to clear up in Syria.
The French Interior Ministry said on Monday that it was “working on a suspension of current asylum files from Syria”. “A decision should be reached in the coming hours,” the same source said. In 2023, more than 4,000 asylum requests from Syrian nationals were recorded in France, according to the latest figures from the French Office for the Protection of Refugees and Stateless Persons (Ofpra), responsible for examining the requests. On Franceinfothe resigning head of French diplomacy, Jean-Noël Barrot, declared that “France has conditioned in a certain way the return of refugees or in any case said that the return of refugees could only happen to the extent that they could return to Syria in safety, as security was not yet completely assured.”
“In addition to anticipating a migratory risk linked to the establishment of an Islamist regime, France must immediately stop all processing of asylum requests from Syrians,” demanded on X, a few minutes before the announcement, the president of the National Rally, Jordan Bardella.
Risk of expulsion in Austria, possible review in Belgium
The Austrian authorities have also announced that they are suspending asylum applications from refugees from this country, but, unlike Sweden which intends to suspend expulsions, the Ministry of the Interior has announced that it is preparing “a repatriation and expulsion program”. Around 7,300 files are affected by this suspension decision, among the approximately 100,000 Syrians living in Austria, one of the countries which has welcomed the most in Europe. Since 2015, around 87,000 Syrians have received a positive response to their asylum request in this country of nine million inhabitants.
The case of those who already have asylum will also be re-examined. Family reunification is also suspended. “In this context, I have instructed the ministry to prepare a repatriation and expulsion program to Syria,” added Interior Minister Gerhard Karner. “The political situation in Syria has fundamentally changed, with a sudden acceleration of events in recent days,” said the ministry, deeming it “important to reassess the situation.”
Belgium has also suspended examinations of asylum applications from Syrian people. Quoted by RTL Belgium, the Secretary of State for Asylum and Migration, Nicole de Moor (CD & V), declared that “refugee status is not necessarily eternal”, and that “if the situation in “Syria is improving sustainably”, she will ask to “re-examine the status of the Syrians who arrived here over the last five years. But it is still too early for that”, she said, specifying that her services will not. not revoke the right to stay of people who have integrated here permanently and who, for example, work here, speak French well and have children of school age.