By Douglas Ernst - The Washington Times - Wednesday, August 10, 2016
Germany has a new problem on its hands with asylum seekers from the Middle East and North Africa: lawsuits.
Roughly 6,000 refugees have filed lawsuits against the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees (BAMF) in 2016. Asylum seekers say the wait times for a decision on their immigration status — up to two years — is unacceptable.
The German magazine Focus reported Monday that the number of complaints in 2016 more than doubled the 2,300 filed last year.
Refugees worry that BAMF will deny their requests as political winds continue to shift against them. German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s Christian Democrats, or CDU, was punished in March elections for her decision to allow 1.1 million refugees into the country in 2015. Increased crime and terrorism prompted authorities to reverse course on her preferred immigration policies.
“The federal government has completely changed its refugee policy, even if it does not admit that,” Horst Seehofer, leader of the Christian Social Union (CSU), told Bild am Sonntag, Reuters reported March 20.
A survey conducted by Der Spiegel at the time showed almost two-thirds of Germans