Germany: Government plans response to Solingen knife attack

German government officials will hold talks with the conservative opposition and federal state representatives to discuss the country's response to the deadly knife attack that left three people dead and eight more injured in the western city of Solingen on Friday.

Chancellor Olaf Scholz said on Wednesday that Interior Minister Nancy Faeser would chair "confidential and targeted talks" with relevant parties, the aim of which he said was "to further reduce irregular migration to Germany."

Key points on the agenda are set to include the deportation of rejected asylum seekers to their countries of origin, the threat posed by Islamist terror and German law on the possession of weapons.

Opposition demands tough asylum measures

The announcement comes after Scholz, of the center-left Social Democrats (SPD), had discussed the Solingen attack with the leader of the conservative opposition Christian Democrats (CDU), Friedrich Merz, on Tuesday.

Merz had reportedly offered Scholz parliamentary support to push through legislation without the SPD's coalition partners, the Green Party and the pro-business Free Democrats (FDP).

Merz, whose party is under severe pressure from the far-right populist Alternative for Germany (AfD) ahead of key state elections in the eastern states of Saxony and Thuringia this weekend, has demanded an "effective moratorium" on refugees from Syria and Afghanistan.

He has also called for rejected asylum applicants from the two war-torn countries to be repatriated, despite human rights concerns, and said that any refugees who travel back to their countries of origin be stripped of their German residency status.

On a European level, Merz has called for permanent checks on the European Union's external borders and even the declaration of a "national emergency" in Germany to enable Berlin to circumvent EU law and turn back migrants to the first EU state they arrived in.

'Populists are trying to divide society'

Chancellor Scholz responded in an interview with broadcaster ZDF on Tuesday night that "the individual right to asylum remains. That is in our constitution, and no one will question it with my support."

At the same time Christian Lindner, the head of the coalition government's smallest partner, the FDP said his party was open to the ideas put forward by Merz.

"If the CDU [wants to] take responsibility after the [Angela] Merkel era, we should discuss their suggestions openly and constructively," he said. "No ideas should be off the table."

But the cross-party talks announced by Chancellor Scholz will also include those who are more skeptical of the radical conservative suggestions.

Vice Chancellor Robert Habeck, of the Greens, for instance, has accused Merz of using the "rhetoric of division," describing the call for exclusive CDU-SPD talks as "somewhat treacherous."

Herbert Reul (CDU), the Interior Minister of the state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW), where Solingen is located, criticized the tone of the public debate following the attack.

His counterpart in the state of Lower Saxony, Daniela Behrens (SPD), concurred. "Five days on from the attack, many issues are being conflated: terrorism, asylum, migration, knife crime [and] Islamic extremism," she said.

"People are scared, politicians are falling over themselves to make demands, and populists are trying to divide society."

Initial government response expected 'soon'

When exactly the first cross-party talks will take place is yet to be announced, but a government spokesman said an initial set of measures is already being finalized.

"Talks have been taking place within the government since Saturday and now in their final stages," said Steffen Hebestreit, adding that he expects results "soon."

Chancellor Scholz had promised an increase in deportations "on a large scale" last year, and the number of deportations was indeed up 34% year-on-year between the first quarters of 2023 and 2024.

"The federal government will continue its efforts to further limit irregular migration," said Scholz. "This includes new legislative measures which we have been discussing intensively since the weekend."

mf/ab (dpa, AP)