Economics

After many years of a massive refugee influx into Europe from Middle East wars, especially going to back to the height of the 2015 migrant crisis, several European countries have ordered a halt to processing asylum applications from Syrians. This comes after the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s government in Syria.

The UK, German, and Austria have confirmed they are freezing their applications. Germany alone has taken in some one million Syrians. Other countries halting their process includes Italy, Norway, Greece, the Netherlands, Belgium, and Finland.

Austria has gone the furthest, with country’s interior minister, Gerhard Karner, saying, “I have instructed the ministry to prepare a program of orderly repatriation and deportation to Syria.”

London’s Home Office also confirmed it has “temporarily paused decisions on Syrian asylum claims whilst we assess the current situation.”

“We keep all country guidance relating to asylum claims under constant review so we can respond to emerging issues,” a spokesperson said.

German officials have also begun signaling that Syrians should make arrangements to return home. Germany’s interior minister, Nancy Faeser, said on Monday that “Many refugees who have found protection in Germany now finally have hope of returning to their Syrian homeland and rebuilding their country.”

However, many Syrians would have greater fear of the new jihadist groups which took over Damascus, and might seek asylum given an al-Qaeda offshoot (HTS) now controls the country. This is especially true of Syrian Christians, Alawites, and Druze.

There’s no assurance that the situation will get any better in Syria under HTS rule, after the basically overnight collapse of an entire state system and its services. One NGO is speaking sense in terms of the realities on the ground:

“Chaos and violence continue to reign in Syria. Armed groups control large parts of the country and there is neither a stable government nor functioning state structures,” its spokesperson Tareq Alaows said in an email. “Much of the infrastructure has been destroyed and millions of people inside Syria are still displaced. Many cities are considered unsafe and there is no sign of a normalization of living conditions.”

Still, the presence of such large numbers of Syrian and other Middle East refugees has long unleashed a political firestorm in European politics. This is whey European officials are relieved that these massive changes in Syria provide an opportunity to send people back to their homeland.