Asylum seeker, migrant, refugee

Who counts as a migrant?

Migrants are people who move to a different location within their own country or outside the country. Usually, one speaks of migrants when people leave their home country of their own accord, for example, to improve their standard of living.

Who counts as a refugee?

Unlike the term migrant, the term refugee is legally defined by the Geneva Convention, which states that refugees are people who are forced to leave their country of origin because of their race, religion, nationality, political beliefs or social affiliation.

Who counts as an asylum seeker?

People who have applied for asylum but have not yet been granted asylum are called asylum seekers. In Germany, the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees (BAMF) processes applications and decides whether the applicant is granted asylum. Until a decision is made, asylum seekers are only allowed to live in refugee shelters and are not allowed to work during the initial period of their stay.

Who is entitled to asylum in Germany?

The German constitution states that, "politically persecuted persons have the right to asylum." This also applies to people who are severely marginalized in their home country for their political beliefs, to the point that their human dignity is violated. Difficult living conditions are not seen as grounds for asylum.

After the disintegration of the Eastern bloc, the basic right to asylum was curtailed: political asylum is now only granted to people who do not come from safe countries of origin.

What is a safe country of origin?

A safe country of origin does not subject members of its population to political persecution or cruel, inhumane and degrading punishment. In Germany, citizens from safe countries of origin are simply deported. This practice is often criticized, as many people feel that each asylum seeker in Germany must be granted the right to prove that he or she faces political threats in their country of origin. An application for asylum from people from safe countries of origin is usually rejected in Germany, unless special circumstances can be proved.

What happens if an asylum application is rejected?

If an application for asylum in Germany is rejected and a person is not recognized as a refugee, he or she must leave Germany. Deportation can be appealed. In the case of a pending deportation or in the event that departure is not possible, the rejected applicants are granted a special temporary residency permit. Reasons may be illness, missing documents or the situation in a particular country. This also applies to underage persons without adult accompaniment.

Applicants who are not granted asylum or not recognized as a refugees may be temporarily given a special protection status in Germany if they are exposed to great dangers at home, like war, torture or the death penalty. The general consensus is that it is currently not reasonable to deport people to Syria, Iraq, Eritrea, Somalia or Afghanistan.

What is the Dublin Agreement?

According to the European Dublin regulation, the first country of contact for migrants in the EU is responsible for processing asylum applications. If refugees, for example, first enter Greece and then travel north to Germany, the northern destination state has the right to deport the refugee to the first country of contact, meaning Greece.

In the past week, Germany has decided to cease using this rule - one reason being that countries in southern Europe, like Greece or Italy, are overwhelmed by the influx of migrants and are not equipped to deal with the situation, so that deporting them back to Greece or Italy would only create more difficulties for all involved parties. The European Commission welcomed this move.