Under pressure to control migration

Increasingly, lines are blurred between asylum seekers fleeing political persecution, refugees seeking safety from civil war and economic migrants who seek to escape poverty at home, exacerbated by climate change. 
 
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has explained his government’s attempts to reach agreements with some of the refugees’ countries of origin with a view to facilitating regular migration for work or study in return for the willingness to take back rejected asylum seekers. 
 
With a rising number of refugees perishing in the Mediterranean, Europe is desperately trying to manage the situation. Politicians have announced a crackdown on smugglers who exploit desperate people promising passage to Europe under life-threatening circumstances. 
 
The EU’s top court has ruled against pushbacks as incompatible with EU law. But recently the bloc has put concerns aside to attempt to secure assistance from African countries with a questionable human rights record to prevent refugees from moving northward, but so far no agreements have been finalized. 
 
Decades after the official end of colonialist rule, European countries are receiving a wave of immigrants from the continent they subjugated and left underdeveloped while they exploited its resources. Natural disasters exacerbated by climate change propelled by the lifestyle of the rich countries are pushing more people to flee. 

This is forcing a rethink in Germany’s Africa policy.

But now Thuringia of all places has made the international headlines not with right-wing extremist attacks, but by making the UNESCO World Heritage list for its historic Jewish monuments in the state capital of Erfurt. 

In this totalitarian state, individuals who did not toe the party line were subjected to a wide range of reprisals.

Much of this has not been made public yet, victims have not been rehabilitated or received any compensation.