A German court’s ruling may have implications for border controls in Germany, potentially rendering them unlawful. The case in question dates back to 2022, in which Austrian junior professor Stefan Salomon, an expert in European and refugee law, took the German government to court over the frequent and invasive border controls he experienced.
Salomon, who travels by train across the German-Austrian border around eight times a year, reported that he is almost always stopped and questioned for identification. In some instances, his luggage was also searched when he refused to provide identification. He claimed that the controls were not justified and took the case to court.
In a second-instance ruling, the Bavarian Administrative Court of Appeals found in Salomon’s favor, deeming the justifications provided by the German government for extending the border controls to be insufficient. Although EU regulations have since undergone minor changes, Salomon believes the underlying circumstances remain similar.
The court’s ruling is directly applicable only to Salomon, but the Bundespolizei (Federal Police) will likely need to take the decision into account in all similar cases. According to Salomon, the police are only allowed to conduct targeted, random and rule-based checks and not the blanket controls that have been in place. The written grounds of the ruling have not yet been published and an appeal was not permitted.