Federal police turn back more than half of asylum seekers at German land borders

In the first half of this year, the federal police rejected just over half of all asylum seekers at the German land borders. However, as can be seen from a response to a parliamentary question from the Left Party, according to the Federal Government, only around five percent of the approximately 20,000 people who were found to have entered the country illegally at a land border applied for asylum.

Of the 1,024 asylum seekers that the federal police registered there, 514 people were reportedly rejected. Around 4,500 unauthorized entries were registered at airports in the first six months of this year.

Rejections have also affected asylum seekers since May 2025

When he took office in May 2025, Federal Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt (CSU) ordered an intensification of temporary border controls, which are not actually provided for in the Schengen area. In addition, it was ordered that asylum seekers would also be rejected in the future, with the exception of people in particular need of protection. These include pregnant women, minors or sick people.

Only one rejection failed

The federal government reports that only one rejection measure failed in the first half of this year, "because France refused to take the people over." The border with France was therefore the section of the border where most unauthorized entries were observed in the first half of the year. The proportion of those rejected among those who entered the country illegally was highest at the border with Poland.

“Constitutional Minister Dobrindt doesn’t take the law very seriously,” criticizes the Left Party’s refugee policy spokeswoman, Clara Bünger. It remains unclear whether his illegal course of rejections will permanently prevent most asylum seekers from entering Germany, as no data is collected on this.

The number of asylum applications filed in Germany has been declining for several years. In the first half of this year there were 39,646 initial asylum applications, a decrease of around 35 percent compared to the same period last year.

One in four was already registered

According to the federal government, around one in four asylum seekers identified by the federal police in the first half of the year had a so-called Eurodac hit. This means that a person's fingerprints match a record already stored in the European fingerprint database Eurodac. This could mean, for example, that someone has already applied for asylum in another European country or was registered there if they entered the country illegally.

According to the Federal Police's statistics, a Eurodac hit is only recorded statistically if someone submits a request for asylum. Fingerprints are not taken from young children. In addition to the EU states, Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Switzerland also take part in Eurodac.

Eurodac is intended to help identify so-called secondary migration, trace previous contacts with authorities and facilitate deportations or transfers back to another EU country.