Stop playing with the fate of Christian refugees from Syria!

Two days before Christmas the Society for Threatened Peoples STP (Gesellschaft für bedrohte Völker GfbV) has appealed to the German Ministers of the Interior to stop playing with the lives and future of the Christian refugees from Syria and other refugees from this country who have been persecuted on account of their religious beliefs. The following statement was made today by the Chairperson of the STP, Tilman Zülch: "We are of course very pleased that Germany’s Ministers of the Interior have bowed to the pressure of the Society for Threatened Peoples and of the EKD (Evangelische Kirche Deutschlands - the largest Protestant church in Germany), which was spurred on by our human rights organisation, in taking in 2,500 persecuted Christians and members of the religious minorities of the Mandaeans and Yezidi from Iraq. But at the same time it is inhuman and absurd to deport Christian and Yezidi refugees to Syria , which is ruled by a dictatorship. Our human rights organisation appeals to the German government to suspend immediately the so-called repatriation agreement made with the torturing state of Syria .” The first deportations have already taken place.

The German government has long known that Christian Assyrian Aramaeans are threatened with prison and torture in Syria if they engage in politics, reports Zülch. Members of the Yezidi community like the Kurds are treated there as second-class citizens. The Yezidi are also threatened with discrimination from parts of the Moslem population. The last 100 Jews – in 1948 there were about 30,000 – live in constant fear for their personal safety. The dictatorial regime in Damascus responds regularly with waves of arrests penalising anyone who stands up for civil and human rights and freedom of religion.

"The German practice of deportation to Syria is really horrible, considering that it takes no regard of the children of the Christian and Yezidi minority who were born or have grown up here”, criticised the human rights activist. They have often been living in Germany for eight, ten or indeed twenty years.

An example of the deportation practice is provided by the family D, Christian Assyrian Aramaeans, who fled to Bavaria in 1996. All members of the family speak excellent German. The daughter (17) is specialising in the sixth form in the course for business and economics and is hoping for a university place. The 14-year old son is at school.

At the STP Christmas campaign "A Light for Refugee Children” the son of a family of seven, which has held temporary residence permits for 20 years in Lower Saxony made a statement: "Germany is our homeland, we are completely integrated and we have many German friends. We no longer have any connection with Syria . And yet we are constantly threatened with deportation.”

The Chairperson of the STP, Tilman Zülch, will be glad to answer questions at politik@gfbv.de