Berlin New Year’s Eve Riots Revive Immigration Debate
By Riham Alkousaa
BERLIN (Reuters – The New Year’s Eve youth riots in Berlin have rekindled a discussion about immigration, just as Germany prepares reforms to attract a new wave skilled foreign workers to Europe’s largest economy.
Numerous journalists, firefighters, police officers, rescue workers, pedestrians, and firefighters were hurt in attacks by young men who lobbed firecrackers at each other and set fire to the streets of Berlin.
Police have taken into custody 145 people, including 47 Germans, 27 Afghans, 21 Syrians and 45 Germans. They continue to investigate whether the riots were planned or spontaneous.
Most incidents took place in neighborhoods with higher immigrant populations. Approximately two-thirds (32%) of those detained were foreigners. This has prompted a national debate in newspapers and television talks about how well immigrants are integrating into German life.
The riots reminded people of the anger at the sexual assaults on women in Cologne in 2015 on New Year’s Eve. This was largely blamed on migrants. It also sparked a national debate over the policy of open-door asylum for former Chancellor Angela Merkel.
“Migration”, which is the top search term on Twitter in Germany for the past two weeks, has been topped by 25% of those searching.
Thomas Hestermann from Macromedia University in Hamburg told Reuters that Germany has been transformed into an immigration society. How well integration works remains an important issue.
MIGRANTS ARE NEEDED FOR 1.8 MMLN VACANCIES
This is at a time when the government of Chancellor Olaf Scholz is trying to liberalise the immigration system by offering easier visas and faster naturalisation in order to fill around 1.8million job vacancies.
RND network reported that Berlin plans to hire around 50,000 more skilled foreign workers each year. Germany must address the worker shortages caused by an aging population. This could pose a threat to economic growth and be a demographic time bomb for its public pension system.
The start of campaigning to win Berlin’s local elections in Febuary coincides with this renewed discussion. There, the conservative CDU has been polling higher than Scholz’s Social Democrats in the region’s election results.
“The debate opened by some parties… before any Police statement, coinciding avec the launch of an election campaign by many parties,” Tareq Aows, the spokesperson for Pro Asyl on refugee policy, told Reuters.
Critics accused CDU’s of dog-whistle Politics after its politicians requested information from the regional senate about the first names detained by German nationals in the riots. This was to help establish their ethnic origins.
Reem Abali-Radovan (German’s state secretary to integration) stated, “We must judge things on basis of actions and not on peoples’ first names.”
Nancy Faeser, federal interior minister, stated that while it was important that the perpetrators of the riot were from a migration background, the incidents shouldn’t be used for political gain.
CDU politicians however, said that the riots were a chance for discussion.
Kai Wegner, a CDU candidate, said that New Year’s Eve was characterized by violent excesses. Now is the time to address the problem. Kai visited a boxing gym where he spoke with the trainer about integrating migrants through the sport.
Wegner stated, “These young Berliners were born here. They are the third generation here, have German passports, we must win their loyalty to our society.”
Civey polls for the Tagesspiegel newspaper suggest that the CDU has not yet made the most of the issue. The CDU’s rating fell 3 percentage points following the riots, compared to a month ago.
Janina muetze, Civey CEO, said that “the CDU was unable” to profit from the New Years Eve riots debate.
Civey revealed that housing, fighting crime, education are the most pressing issues facing Berliners at this time.
PERCEPTION AND REALITY
Hestermann stated that media coverage of events such as the Berlin Riots was often focused on the ethnic origins of the perpetrators. This led to an inaccurate perception about migrants.
He and his team have been studying German media reports on crime since 2007. They discovered that broadcast media’s attention to the criminal origins of suspects increased sixfold following the 2015 Cologne attack.
Their research has shown that around 90% of the criminal suspects mentioned in media reports are linked to foreigners.
Hestermann stated, “These numbers paint a completely other picture than what police statistics reveal.”
The same time, however, Germany’s integration climate index (a nationwide survey of 15,005 people’s assessment of immigration and integration in Germany) has reached its highest level since 2015.
Survey results showed that over 90% of respondents considered their personal contact with people from other cultures to be extremely positive.
Alaows, a refugee who arrived in the country in 2015, said that integration is not a one way street and had to abandon his bid for the German parliament in 2021 due to racist threats.
He said, “Migrants must accept the values of this society and adapt to them. However, inclusion of these new citizens in society is also the responsibility.”
(Reporting done by Riham Alkousaa, Additional reporting by Swantje and Madeline Chambers, Editing by Matthias Williams