Luise Amtsberg, the Greens’ rapporteur on Syria and the Middle East and a member of the Foreign Affairs Committee, sharply rebuked German Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s claim that roughly 80 percent of Syrians living in Germany should return in the next three years.
Merz’s statement, she said, is not only unrealistic but “cynical” and it ignores the fragile security situation in Syria as well as the fact that many Syrian refugees are already integral parts of German society.
Amtsberg, who visited Syria herself in February, described the country’s conditions as desolate. Near Damascus she could see how the Assad regime had systematically destroyed whole cities. “Rebuilding there isn’t about erecting new houses” she told the Funke media group’s Tuesday papers, “but starting from scratch and creating a living environment at all”. She added that people who have witnessed that devastation firsthand cannot credibly claim that a safe, nationwide backdrop for return exists, nor that returning is merely a personal decision.
She urges Chancellor Merz to deliver unequivocal words to the Syrian transitional president. Military violence in Syria’s northeast must stop immediately. For a peaceful future, Germany needs to support a national dialogue that includes all groups, permits political parties, addresses past crimes, and strengthens civil society. “Anyone claiming to shape a peaceful future in Syria must not frame the debate in Germany around expulsions; the focus has to be on the situation of those affected” Amtsberg insisted.