The area in the eastern region of Switzerland bordering on Germany is – according to experience – especially semipermeable in one direction only.
As the maximum length of stay for rejected asylum seekers in Switzerland until their deportation may not exceed 140 days, these illegals have another escape route: Germany.
In order to accelerate the Swiss asylum procedures even further and to make them “more cost-efficient”, all asylum processing centres have now been decentralized into six asylum regions.
Since last week, those asylum seekers who have been rejected by the “asylum processing centre of Eastern Switzerland”, which includes the cantons of Schaffhausen, Thurgau and St Gallen, will be accommodated in a “reception and processing center” in Kreuzlingen.
The geographic location is no coincidence. In an internal letter from the German Federal Police, they warn of the consequences: “Against this backdrop, significantly more rejected asylum seekers are likely to disappear in the area close to the border than before. An increase in unauthorized entry into Germany is to be expected. ”
The distance of the newly created Swiss Federal Asylum center from Kreuzlingen to the German state border is only 300 meters.
To make matters worse, according to information published by German tabloid Bild, the 330 km long Swiss (EU) border have no frontier checks take place.
Their warnings are based on the experience that many migrants in unfriendly Switzerland prefer the German Merkel system.
Previously, in 2015, it took an average of 280 days to expel unwanted foreigners from Switzerland. But the new rules on asylum procedures now in force across Switzerland, while providing free legal advice for asylum seekers, is less welcoming than across the border.
In the course of their investigation, the German Federal Police found over 4 100 “illegally arrived migrants” via Switzerland in 2018.
As of March 1, Swiss asylum requests will mostly be processed in new federal asylum seekers’ centres, rather than in the cantons. Only around 80 percent of the accommodation capacity is ready, the Swiss Justice Ministry said in a press release on Thursday.
The Swiss Refugee Council supported the new measures but some organisations including the Democratic Jurists of Switzerland and the Centre Social Protestants say the new arrangements go against their ethics and independence.
The Justice Ministry says the new procedures will “make it possible to integrate recognised refugees and temporarily admitted persons more quickly – but also to return more quickly those persons who are not dependent on Swiss protection”.
Since 2014, Swiss asylum procedures have been shortened by a third. The number of complaints has also fallen by a third and three times as many asylum seekers have returned to their country voluntarily.