Germany Tells Ukraine’s War Refugees: Our Borders Are Open

(Bloomberg) -- Germany signaled it's ready to welcome as many refugees fleeing the war in Ukraine as needed in another sign of how Russia's invasion of its neighbor has triggered radical policy shifts in Berlin.

Before President Vladimir Putin sent in the troops a week ago, the idea of again throwing open Germany's borders to people fleeing conflict would have seemed politically untenable. The nation is still highly sensitive to the issue after former Chancellor Angela Merkel's decision in 2015 to welcome thousands of Syrian refugees.

Yet the attack on Ukraine has prompted the government in Berlin to rethink certain positions. Chancellor Olaf Scholz on Sunday announced a massive increase in defense spending and Germany has also abandoned a policy of not sending weapons into conflict zones.

Now, politicians from both the ruling coalition and the main opposition conservatives -- who have traditionally taken a harder line on immigration issues -- are signaling to Ukraine's refugees that Germany's doors are wide open.

“We as the German states say clearly: You are welcome here,” Michael Kretschmer, the Christian Democrat premier of the eastern state of Saxony, told reporters Thursday. “It's a Herculean task before us to find accommodation for these flocks of people.”

Kretschmer was speaking after chairing a rare session of the foreign affairs committee in the upper house of parliament where Germany's 16 states are represented. The meeting was also attended by Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock.

Kretschmer's region is one where the anti-immigrant AfD party has some of its strongest support in Germany at around 25%, making his comments even more noteworthy.

“The world has changed, not only in Ukraine but also in the rest of Europe,” Baerbock, a member of the Greens party, said alongside Kretschmer, who praised her for her leadership during the crisis.

“It goes without saying that we are giving protection to people together with our friends and neighbors in Poland, in Slovakia, in Hungary,” she said. “And it underscores that this is about our shared values as Europeans.”

German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser said earlier Thursday that relatively few refugees have arrived in the country so far, putting the number at around 5,500. That's out of a total of around one million who have sought refuge in neighboring countries, according to a United Nations estimate.

She was speaking on German radio from Brussels, where she and her European Union counterparts discussed the activation of a mechanism that will provide Ukrainian refugees with residence permits and access to education and jobs for as long as three years. 

The EU's commissioner for home affairs, Ylva Johansson, said it may take as long as a week for the so-called protection directive to be adopted.

“Member states will need some time to go through it and maybe make some amendments,” Johansson said.

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