Germany to speed up deportations – Scholz

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has vowed to crack down on illegal migration and speed up refugee deportations in light of a deadly stabbing spree allegedly committed by an asylum seeker of Syrian decent. Scholz made the pledge while visiting the site of the attack earlier on Monday.

A lone knifeman assaulted spectators at the Festival of Diversity in the city of Solingen on Friday night. Three people were killed in the attack and eight others wounded. While the suspected perpetrator fled the scene amid the panic, he later turned himself in.

German media later reported, citing the authorities, that the suspect is a 26-year-old Syrian refugee who entered the country seeking asylum in 2022. He reportedly may have been operating on orders from Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS), which initially claimed responsibility for the attack.

Scholz condemned the attack as an act of “terrorism against us all,” and pledged to act in order to avoid further incidents.

“I am angry and furious about this act. It must be punished quickly and severely… We must do everything we can to ensure that such things never happen in our country,” the chancellor said, adding that Berlin must “ensure that those who… are not allowed to stay in Germany are repatriated and deported.”

Scholz was referring to migrants who have committed serious crimes or whose applications for asylum have been rejected. He added that while deportations have so far increased by around two-thirds compared to 2021, the government will continue to seek legal and practical ways to rid the country of people who pose a security threat. He also suggested setting up a task force with other EU member-states in order to deal with ‘Dublin cases’ – refugees who enter Germany from other European countries while already being registered for asylum elsewhere.

According to German media outlets, the suspect in Friday’s stabbing initially applied for asylum in Bulgaria prior to entering Germany. However, when his application was rejected by the German authorities in 2023 and they tried to deport him, he could not be found.

Apart from cracking down on illegal migration, Scholz pledged to tighten the laws on owning weapons, in particular knives, in light of last week’s stabbing.

Migration has been the subject of heated debate in Germany for years, with local governments often complaining that their budgets are stretched too thin to accommodate all asylum seekers. Following the Solingen stabbing, the leader of the Christian Democrats (CDU), Friedrich Merz, slammed Berlin’s immigration policies as “naive,” while calling for a total freeze on the admission of refugees from countries considered unsafe, such as Syria.