Alongside Germany, Sweden was for many years one of the main destinations for asylum seekers in Europe. This has changed. Since 2016, the number of asylum seekers has been declining more or less continuously. The reason for this is the U-turn in refugee policy – implemented by the Social Democratic-led government and further tightened since 2022 by the conservative minority government. The latter is tolerated by the right-wing populist Sweden Democrats, who have a significant influence on migration policy. In their agreement, the right-wing populists and the governing parties agreed on a series of stricter measures, including more deportations. As a result, Sweden is now being cited in the German debate on deportations to Afghanistan as an example. Recently, CDU General Secretary Carsten Linnemann wrote after an Afghan attacked a police officer in Mannheim: “Sweden shows that it is possible. Several people were directly deported from there to Afghanistan last year for crimes.”
But can Sweden really serve as a model for deportations? In fact, according to police reports, the country deported nine people to Afghanistan from January 2023 to May 2024. Three of them were deported for crimes, according to a police spokeswoman, one person was “deported” after a check at an internal border, and five people were handed over to the police by the Migration Agency; in other words, they had lost their residence status.
Deportations are a tricky matter. They fail for various reasons, including lack of identification documents, illnesses, absconding deportees, and lack of cooperation from the country of origin. After all, the latter must accept its citizens back. Sweden, like Germany, does not recognize the Taliban government. There are no diplomatic relations, which makes cooperation on deportations impossible. How exactly the police manage to bring Afghans back to their homeland is not explained. A spokeswoman says there are no direct flights to Afghanistan, “the return is handled via transit.” And all returnees had “accepted” the deportations. In fact, these are voluntary departures, not deportations.
In November, broadcaster SVT reported on how this is done. Sweden wants to return Afghans using a trick – specifically via a detour through Uzbekistan. “We fly together to Uzbekistan and make sure they board the plane to Kabul,” SVT quoted a senior police officer. Swedish radio also reported on this “new way” of enabling deportations to Afghanistan. According to this, the police use the Afghan airline Kam Air, which is on the EU’s red list due to lack of safety standards. The deportees fly with the police to Uzbekistan and then board the plane to Kabul. All on a voluntary basis, as there is no cooperation with the regime there. Efforts are being made in Sweden to increase the “voluntariness” of those required to leave. For example, by shortening the residence status or the planned accommodation of children in deportation centers. For the government in Stockholm, the issue of deportation, especially of criminals, is high on the agenda.
Even regarding Syria, a hard line is being pursued. According to SVT, by September 2023, 73 Syrian criminals had been sentenced to deportation. However, by the end of the year, the vast majority were still in the country. After all, there are no diplomatic relations with the Syrian regime. Deportations of convicted criminals to Somalia are also difficult; instead of being flown back home, they are now often shuffled from facility to facility in Sweden, according to media reports. From the Swedish government’s perspective, this is likely a means to an end, just like the departure of a few Afghans. Similar to neighboring Denmark, whose strict asylum policy now serves as a model for Sweden and Finland, signals are being sent abroad to reduce the influx.
In Denmark, many Syrians are currently losing their protection status if they come from certain areas of the country that are considered safe by the authorities. Since they cannot be deported, they live in so-called transit centers, often in remote rural areas. Many of them eventually disappear, presumably moving to other European countries. In 2023, only around 2,500 asylum seekers came to Denmark, compared to 4,500 in 2022 and about 21,000 in 2015.
In Sweden, the development is now similar, although the numbers are still higher: According to the statistics office, there were around 12,600 asylum seekers in 2023, compared to 16,800 in 2022 and about 162,900 in 2015. Hardly any Afghans are currently coming to Sweden, according to migration experts. However, the number of those obligated to return to Afghanistan has significantly decreased. According to the Swedish police, this is due to deportation orders expiring after four years and the suspension of enforcement in a significant number of cases due to the Taliban takeover in 2021. By the end of 2022, the police had around 4,000 open cases, and by the end of 2023, there were only 923.
Many Afghans who came to Sweden in 2015 and 2016 are now living under very difficult conditions, including many who were once unaccompanied minors, says Madelaine Seidlitz, the chief legal advisor for the human rights organization Amnesty International in Sweden. People are losing their housing, their work permits, and many are also ending up in detention centers. “They are in a permanent state of limbo,” says Seidlitz. Many of these people should now return to Afghanistan but have not been there for years. Some belong to minorities, and many have adopted a Western lifestyle, which significantly complicates their chances of survival in Afghanistan. Due to the current human rights situation there, no one should be forced to return to Afghanistan, says Seidlitz. Given the Taliban regime and the current human rights situation, almost everyone being sent back to Afghanistan is at risk of persecution, says Seidlitz.
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