Domestic Security and Immigration

SPD

The Social Democrats want to equip German security authorities with the world's largest digital transmission system. The party draws a sharp line separating the responsibilities of the armed forces (foreign security) and those of the police (domestic security). The German army, the Bundeswehr, should not be deployed within Germany's borders to deter terrorist activities. The SPD wants to increase knowledge of the Islamic religion by offering more classes on it in public schools. The classes should be taught by teachers trained in the German educational system. Forced marriages should be entered into the law books as a criminal offence.

CDU/ CSU

The CDU and CSU want to broaden the responsibilities of the Bundeswehr to increase its role in anti-terror preparation for the 2006 World Cup in Germany, for example. Police and news agencies should receive a common analysis center and a common databank. A visa-warning file should be initiated, and the ministry of the interior should have the supervision over the distribution of visas. The CDU and CSU want to pass a ruling making the sexual exploitation of victims of human trafficking a criminal offense. Immigration should be limited to filling gaps in labor supply and to leading experts in science and economics. Abetting forced marriages should become a criminal offense unto itself.

The Greens

The Greens are against an amendment of the Basic Law, Germany's constitution, that would enable domestic deployment of the Bundeswehr. The police and news agencies should remain strictly separated. Telephone surveillance should be strictly limited, and there should be no central databank for biometric data. The Greens support a simplified naturalization process and stand for double citizenship. They also want to do away with renewals of residence permits on a month-by-month basis and institute longer-term permits instead.

FDP

News agencies and the police should remain in strict separation. The free-market liberal Free Democratic Party is against a common anti-terror database for regular investigation authorities and news agencies. The Bundeswehr should not be allowed to operate internally. Additionally, the party wants to nullify an EU directive allowing for the inclusion of biometric data in identity documentation. To take DNA from people and save a DNA model based on that data, and to distribute this data or use it for criminal investigations should only be allowed in the case of "criminal offences of great importance." The FDP strongly opposes selective authorizations for surveillance measures and favors instead an overarching political concept. The ruling over "great eavesdropping," which allows for surveillance of conversations in private quarters, should be outlawed. Telephone and video surveillance should be limited.

The Left Party

The Left Party wants to keep the police and secret service separate. It wants to abolish the audio surveillance law. The Bundeswehr should not conduct anti-terror missions within Germany. Non-Germans residing in Germany should be granted suffrage. Double citizenship should be legalized. The Left Party calls political asylum laws, such as the residence requirement stipulating that asylum seekers remain in the district granting their asylum, "discriminating exception laws," and wants to see them repealed.