“Stopping the returns sends a bad signal and probably motivates other Afghan citizens to leave their homes and go to the EU. (…) We therefore call on you and your teams in the Commission to intensify discussions with the Afghan Government on how returns to Afghanistan could and will take place in the coming months, “the letter read in a Belgian journalist’s Twitter account. Knack magazine. It was signed by migration ministers or other representatives of Germany, Austria, Denmark, Belgium, the Netherlands and Greece.
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According to Reuters, the European Commission has confirmed that it has received the letter and intends to respond to it later.
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Politicians say in the letter that Afghanistan has been the country from which the largest numbers of asylum seekers come to the EU for several years. Approximately 570,000 asylum seekers have arrived in EU countries since 2015, the document states; this trend is now continuing and the current struggles will only strengthen it. Therefore, according to the signed ministers responsible for migration in their countries, the EU should continue to return people to Afghanistan, both voluntarily and involuntarily.
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The signatories acknowledge that the situation in the country is very tense and that existing projects in neighboring countries are not sufficient to support the population and it would be good to support them more in the future under various EU programs.
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An open letter was defended by one of the signatories, Belgian Secretary of State for Asylum and Migration Sammy Mahdi. The fact that “some regions of the country are not safe does not mean that every national of this country is automatically entitled to protection,” he wrote on Twitter.
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The Taliban launched a large-scale offensive in Afghanistan in May, when foreign troops withdrew from the country. During it, he controlled over half of Afghan districts and the six provincial capitals.
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The issue of the deportation of Afghans will probably be one of the topics at an extraordinary meeting of the interior ministers of the EU member states, which the Slovenian presidency convened on 18 August.
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