A German court’s ruling has sparked concerns among police union officials, who fear that officers may face legal risks for carrying out asylum seeker rejections at the German-Polish border. The German Police Union (GdP) has internalized a report suggesting that the German government’s practice of rejecting asylum seekers is likely in breach of the law.
According to the report, which was cited by the German news magazine Der Spiegel, the likelihood of successful lawsuits is high. The union is drawing a line in the sand, urging officers to express their doubts and refuse to carry out orders if they believe they are in conflict with the law. The threshold of serious doubt has been reached, the report claims, following the Berlin court’s decision.
The GdP is also citing the opinion of a Berlin-based criminologist, Johannes Eisenberg, who in January concluded that police officers could be compelled to protest against the orders if the rejections are deemed unlawful. Eisenberg warned that, in the event of a court ruling against the government, officers who had carried out the rejections could face charges of coercion, potentially even kidnapping, depending on the circumstances of their actions.