The SVP’s border protection initiative crosses several red lines. Dispute among ski tourists: man bites off the tip of a Briton’s nose

Maximum 5,000 asylum applications per year. No asylum migration via EU states. Cancellation of temporary admission status. And of course fixed border controls. With its border protection initiative, the SVP wants to radically restructure the Swiss asylum system. It accepts the termination of the Schengen/Dublin Agreement with the EU.

The SVP seems to forget that the EU and its member states have also continuously tightened the common asylum system in recent years. The EU’s course on asylum policy has long since shifted to the right.

One country repeatedly mentioned in connection with particularly strict asylum practices is Denmark. The government of Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen, with its restrictive course, now serves as a role model in many places – even if, or precisely because, it is a social democrat.

The Danish ‘zero asylum seeker policy’ as a role model

In 2021, Frederiksen issued a ‘zero asylum seeker’ policy. Although not a law, it is a goal that Denmark wants to achieve with particularly high asylum barriers, the reduction of services and a generally anti-migrant climate. In 2022, the country with its 5.8 million inhabitants received 4,597 asylum applications – including Ukrainians. However, the picture is not uniform: in 2023, Denmark introduced a rule under which women and girls from Afghanistan are automatically granted asylum. A practice that Switzerland also implements and which the SVP rejects. Moreover, Denmark is not located in the heart of Europe, like Switzerland, but in the far north. The only land border is a narrow corridor of 67 kilometers with Germany.

Together with Great Britain, Denmark is also a pioneer in the plan to outsource asylum procedures to third countries. Like Britain, Denmark has signed a corresponding agreement with Rwanda. So far, no asylum seeker has been deported to the African country due to legal hurdles. At the beginning of last year, Denmark put the plan on hold for the time being.

Demands for an upper limit on asylum, such as those of the SVP, also appear again and again in Europe. Especially in Germany, where the CDU/CSU opposition prominently called last year for an upper limit of a maximum of 200,000 refugees per year. Calculated based on the population of Switzerland, this would be approximately 20,000 asylum applications annually, instead of the 5,000 proposed by the SVP.

However, experts agree that a fixed upper limit would be incompatible with obligations under the Geneva Refugee Convention. The 200,001st refugee also has the individually guaranteed fundamental right to apply for asylum. Nevertheless, Chancellor Olaf Scholz also announced that asylum practices would be tightened and promised to deport those who had no right to remain in Germany “on a large scale.”

The stricter Schengen legislation should make rejection at the border easier

In addition to the national level, the asylum screw was also tightened at the EU level. The new “Asylum and Migration Pact”, which the EU recently agreed upon after long negotiations, provides for stricter procedures for asylum seekers at the external borders. People with little prospect of asylum must be accommodated in closed centers and receive their decision within a maximum of three months. They must then be quickly deported to their country of origin or to safe third countries. This is intended to prevent irregular transit and so-called ‘secondary migration’.

Negotiations are currently underway in Brussels to tighten the so-called ‘Schengen Border Code’. The plan is to make it easier for people without a valid residence permit to be sent back across the border from one EU country to another. A majority of EU member states insist that this also applies to asylum seekers. That would not be as general as the SVP’s demand that no one who has previously traveled through a safe EU country should be allowed to apply for asylum. But the possibilities for secondary movements of asylum seekers would be further limited. The EU Parliament, on the other hand, is likely to take a stand and continue to insist on the fundamental right of the individual to seek asylum.

Ultimately, the SVP’s demand for the reintroduction of fixed border controls would also cross a red line. These are possible under Schengen law and are currently taking place in Germany and France, among others, on the border with Switzerland. However, they must be proportionate, justified and, above all, limited in time. Systematic, fixed border controls, as the SVP wants, would mean an open break with the Schengen Agreement. Swiss Justice Minister Beat Jans recently said on the sidelines of the meeting of EU interior ministers in Brussels that the introduction of border controls was “no problem” for the Federal Council. (aargauerzeitung.ch)