Keller-Sutter keeps refugees waiting

Outgoing Justice Minister Karin Keller-Sutter (58, FDP) suspends the resettlement of particularly vulnerable refugees in Switzerland. Since 1955, the country has repeatedly received groups of refugees from Hungary, Tibet, boat people from Vietnam and people from the former Yugoslavia. As the “NZZ am Sonntag” reports, Keller-Sutter now behaves as the Bundesrat did in the 1990s, when a particularly large number of people from this Mediterranean area sought protection in Switzerland because of the Balkan war.

It was only in 2013, under the leadership of Justice Minister Simonetta Sommaruga (62, SP), that the full Federal Council decided to resettle groups of particularly vulnerable refugees because of the crisis in Syria.

Particularly vulnerable

He later agreed to participate continuously in the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) resettlement program and to decide to take in 1,500 to 2,000 refugees every two years. It is already certain that these people seeking protection are actually refugees before they are selected. It is often women, children, old and sick people who reach Switzerland and other countries who participate in the program.

On 19 May 2021, the Bundesrat decided to take in another 1,600 refugees for 2022 and 2023. In addition, 220 extra people in Switzerland should find protection through the program because fewer refugees than planned found their way to our country through the UN program due to the corona pandemic. A total of 1,820 such refugees would be admitted this year and next.

Many asylum seekers

By temporarily suspending the admission of particularly vulnerable persons, Keller-Sutter is following a recommendation from the special asylum staff (SONAS), which the federal councilor had set up in the spring due to the tense situation in the asylum system.

The Sonas members met on November 30 for a meeting to discuss the decision, according to the article in “NZZ am Sonntag”. The minutes of the meeting are in the Sunday paper. “Le Temps” also reported about it.

The reason for the moratorium is obvious: due to the approximately 70,000 refugees from Ukraine who have protection status S. But also due to the simultaneous strong increase in the number of other asylum seekers – the federal government expects up to 24,000 asylum applications – the Swiss asylum system is reaching certain limits at.

Get more seats

But: thanks to additional army posts, the situation had recently eased again. At the end of November, the State Secretariat for Migration (SEM), led by Christine Schraner Burgener (59), announced that it would no longer allocate asylum seekers to the cantons whose asylum procedure had not yet been completed.

Since there were hardly any places left in the federal asylum centres, the SEM made use of the option of sending asylum seekers to the cantons early in the event of a lack of space. With the introduction of accelerated asylum procedures, this practice actually belonged to the past.

The fact that resettlements are suspended despite the slight relaxation of the asylum system announced by the SEM at the end of November is surprising at first sight. However, the places to stay in the cantons are still scarce and the same applies to the staff in many places. And since resettled refugees are particularly vulnerable people, they need a lot of care.

800 people hope for EBS

So far, Switzerland has received 641 of the planned 1,820 resettled refugees. As the “NZZ am Sonntag” writes, the SEM has assured that those already selected for the program can still enter until the end of March 2023. That’s 350 to 400 people. For the remaining 800 or so it means: wait.

Her hope, however, is Elisabeth Baume-Schneider (58, SP). The new Minister of Justice, better known as EBS, will take office on January 1, 2023. She is considered more open than Keller-Sutter when it comes to migration policy. It is up to the new Federal Councilor to lift the suspension. (pt)