In a startling confirmation of the rising power of Germany's populist movement, on Friday Germany's new Interior Minister Horst Seehofer declared that "Islam does not belong to Germany" while setting out hardline immigration policies in an interview published on Friday, in an attempt to ward off rising anti-immigration challengers.
“Islam does not belong to Germany,” Seehofer said, contradicting former German president Christian Wulff who fueled a debate over immigration in 2010 by saying Islam was part of Germany. In 2015 Merkel echoed Wulff’s words at a time when anti-immigration campaign group PEGIDA - or Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West - was holding marches.
Closing the book on Merkel's disastrous "open door" policies, Seehofer told Bild he would push through a "master plan for quicker deportations”, in his first major interview since he was sworn into office on Wednesday.
The minister - a member of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s CSU Bavarian allies who are further to the right than her own Christian Democrats - said he would also classify more states as "safe" countries of origin, which would make it easier to deport failed asylum seekers. The statements - an obvious attempt to court populist voters - come after Merkel’s conservatives, and their coalition allies - the Social Democrats - lost ground to the anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany (AfD) party in elections last year.
As Reuters notes, Seehofer is particularly keen to show his party is tackling immigration ahead of Bavaria’s October regional election, when the AfD is expected to enter that state assembly.
“Of course the Muslims living here do belong to Germany,” Seehofer said before going on to say Germany should not give up its own traditions or customs, which had Christianity at their heart.
More at: https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-...belong-germany
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