Amidst Germany\u2019s worsening housing crisis, an influx of new migrants, and rising anti-immigrant sentiment, experts have warned that the German government\u2019s current asylum policies give preferential treatment to Ukrainian refugees over their Afghan counterparts.<\/p>\n
For nearly a decade, Germany has taken in by far the most refugees<\/a> out of all the European nations. In 2015, in the face of Middle Eastern crises that had displaced millions from their home countries, then-German Chancellor Angela Merkel adopted asylum policies that led the country to accept the vast majority of the refugees fleeing to Europe. As a result, between 2015 and 2021, Germany granted asylum to 1.24 million refugees<\/a>, most of whom came from Syria and Afghanistan.<\/p>\n But following the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, an influx of nearly one million Ukrainian refugees <\/a>threatened to overwhelm Germany\u2019s migrant processing system, leaving the government scrambling to find additional housing for the new refugees amidst a nationwide housing shortage<\/a>.<\/p>\n In some cases, the government chose to prioritize the needs of Ukrainian refugees over Syrian or Afghan refugees. \u201c[Some] Afghans were in hotels for more than a year before [the German government managed to] find them proper housing,\u201d said Abdul Wahid Wafa, the former director of the Afghanistan Center at Kabul University. \u201cBut there was a lot of news about the different kind of welcome by the government [for Ukrainians].\u201d<\/p>\n Indeed, in April 2022, Foreign Policy<\/em> reported that Berlin\u2019s local government was displacing Afghan refugees<\/a> from state-provided accommodations to free up room for Ukrainian refugees. \u201cOf course it\u2019s not the Ukrainians\u2019 fault, but we have to reflect on our solidarity if it\u2019s only targeting certain people,\u201d Tareq Alaows, a board member of the Berlin Refugee Council, told Foreign Policy<\/em>. \u201cThe last months showed that different treatment of refugees is possible.\u201d<\/p>\n Since the Russian invasion, Afghan refugees have also voiced frustrations that they are subject to far more restrictive integration policies than their Ukrainian counterparts. Under the European Union\u2019s Temporary Protection Directive<\/a>, Ukrainians are automatically granted asylum upon arrival in Germany and are eligible to begin working immediately<\/a>. In contrast, most Afghan refugees are only granted a temporary residence permit while they wait to apply for asylum. \u201c[With only a temporary residence permit,] you don\u2019t have the right to take integration courses, you cannot apply for university courses or degrees, and sometimes you don\u2019t even have a work permit,\u201d said Khusraw Amiri, a staffer in the Afghan consulate of Munich (which still represents the former Afghan republican government, not the Taliban regime).<\/p>\n Of course, there are pragmatic reasons for enforcing different policies for the two groups of refugees, noted Wafa. \u201cUkrainians are considered short-term migrants who will [return to Ukraine after the war], but for countries in the Middle East, it\u2019s not the case,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Ukrainian refugees also share more cultural and linguistic ties with their hosts, easing the refugees\u2019 integration into German society. \u201cUkrainians are from Europe; they are close neighbors, and they are closer in terms of culture and language and their way of clothing,\u201d Wafa added.<\/p>\n But according to Wolfgang Danspeckgruber, a Princeton University professor who studies modern Afghan and European affairs, part of the difference in refugee policies should be directly attributed to racism. \u201c[I know someone] who fell in love with an Afghan refugee,\u201d he said. \u201cAfter seven years, [the refugee] couldn\u2019t even get a passport, because he\u2019s Afghan and Muslim. That\u2019s it. That\u2019s the story.\u201d<\/p>\n Germany\u2019s flailing economic health could also play a factor in the disparities between Afghan and Ukrainian refugees. \u201cIf the economy isn\u2019t doing that well, [attitudes toward migrants] will be even more antagonistic,\u201d Danspeckgruber said. \u201cIf you feel that you are in a total crisis mode [at home], you will protect first those who are part of your wider family, which the Ukrainians are \u2014\u00a0and which all the others outside Europe are not.\u201d<\/p>\n Indeed, Danspeckgruber warned that far-right political parties are using Germany\u2019s economic situation to stoke increasingly nativist views toward migrants from the Middle East, which will exacerbate policy differences. \u201c[People are now] super conscientious of the \u2018them versus us\u2019 [narrative],\u201d he said. \u201cThe \u2018them\u2019 are the Islamists, meaning the Afghans and other non-Judeo-Christian migrants in Europe.\u201d<\/p>\n Current attitudes and unequal treatment aside, however, Wafa argued Germany still bears a high degree of moral responsibility for Afghan refugees at the end of the day. \u201c[European] countries went [to Afghanistan] for 20 years; they had forces there, soldiers were there, and they had a lot of projects,\u201d he said. \u201cThere is a lot of obligation as human beings and as part of a member of nations around the world to keep these migrants.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Amidst Germany\u2019s worsening housing crisis, an influx of new migrants, and rising anti-immigrant sentiment, experts have warned that the German government\u2019s current asylum policies give preferential treatment to Ukrainian refugees over their Afghan counterparts. For nearly a decade, Germany has taken in by far the most refugees out of all the European nations. In 2015,<\/p>\n