German politician leading polls calls for ECHR exit over migration crisis
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GB NEWS
Germany should leave the European Convention on Human Rights in a bid to tackle a surging migrant crisis, one of the country's leading politicians has said.
Jens Spahn, of the poll-leading Christian Democratic Union (CDU), has warned that German courts have handed out asylum too freely - and beyond the remit of the ECHR - for years, with the country receiving almost 250,000 applications in 2024 alone.
CDU leader Friedrich Merz has vowed to declare a national emergency to turn away prospective asylum seekers as a result, while Spahn has said he would be willing to risk diplomatic confrontation to secure Germany's borders.
Spahn told The Times: "The oath I took as a minister was to ward off harm to the German people. My oath was not to always have a good atmosphere with our neighbours.
Jens Spahn has said he would be willing to risk diplomatic confrontation to secure Germany's borders
REUTERS
"I want a good atmosphere, but not at any cost. We just can't endure [the level of asylum claims in Germany] any longer.
"The irregular migration is more than over the limit. And so we are in fact in an emergency situation and suitable measures must be possible."
Though Germany must "provide protection" to asylum seekers, Spahn said, he has vowed that the country needs to be able to wrestle back control of its borders from the ECHR.
"If you come to the conclusion - and this is the debate that is also happening in the UK at the moment - that [asylum rules] can't be changed... then of course you have to think again about your membership [of the ECHR]," Spahn said.
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'The irregular migration is more than over the limit... We are in fact in an emergency situation,' Spahn said
REUTERS
"It is not ordained by God that we have to be a member in all these things.
"We are happy to be a member, we're convinced multilateralists, but it has to deliver some benefit."
Spahn served as a minister under Angela Merkel, who has seen her legacy clouded in the wake of the migration and energy crises, as well as Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
But with the CDU eyeing up a return to power in next year's election, its leading figures have publicly distanced themselves from the former Chancellor.
Leading CDU figures have been forced to publicly distance themselves from Angela Merkel
PASpahn said: "We are learning everything from our mistakes... Those were, at the end of the day, good years for Germany, in an economic sense as well.
"But from today's perspective you would decide some things differently. We wouldn't have exited atomic energy; we wouldn't have got ourselves into such a deep dependency on Russian gas.
"We should have brought illegal immigration to an end much earlier. We have been learning from our mistakes for the past three years. We took a bitter defeat [in 2021]. We weren't good enough any more."
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