Germany’s government has ordered border controls to begin at all of its land borders for six months to tackle illegal immigration and extremist threats.
The controls will start on Sept. 16. At a press conference on Monday, Interior Minister Nancy Faeser said that the government had notified the European Union of the order to set up border controls at the land borders with France, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Belgium, and Denmark.
“We are strengthening our internal security through concrete action and we are continuing our tough stance against irregular migration,” Faeser said.
Germany’s decision to impose border controls challenges the Schengen Agreement, which allows for free movement across European countries without internal border checks.
Under the European Union’s rules, countries in the Schengen area—which includes all EU countries except Cyprus and Ireland—are only allowed to introduce border checks as a last resort to avert threats to internal security or public policy.
The 26-year-old suspect, a Syrian national, surrendered to police and is being held on suspicion of murder and membership of a terrorist organization.
The Syrian was supposed to be deported to Bulgaria last year but disappeared for a time and avoided deportation, according to German media reports.
“We will have to do everything so that those who aren’t allowed to stay in Germany are sent back and deported,” Scholz said last month. “We have massively expanded the possibilities to carry out such deportations.”
The chancellor noted that deportations had already increased by 30 percent this year. “We will look very closely at how we can contribute to raising these figures even further,” Scholz said.
Last week, the populist Alternative for Germany (AfD) made a breakthrough in state elections, emerging as the dominant political force in eastern Germany.
AfD leaders have called for strict border controls and a reduction in asylum seekers.
