Germany will clamp down on illegal immigration, Islamism, and knife crime in the wake of last week’s deadly stabbing attack in Solingen, Interior Minister Nancy Faeser has announced. She added that police and regional authorities would be given more powers to enforce new regulations.
On August 23, a knife-wielding attacker began lunging at revelers at the Festival of Diversity in the city of Solingen in Germany’s western North Rhine-Westphalia region. The man killed three people and injured another eight before fleeing the scene.
Authorities later detained a 26-year-old suspect, identified as Issa Al H., a Syrian asylum seeker who entered the country in 2022. According to media reports, he may have been operating on orders from Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS), which has claimed responsibility for the attack.
Speaking at a press conference on Thursday, Faeser vowed that “we as the state will respond to this terrorist act with all the necessary severity.”
“We will tighten gun laws, we will strengthen the powers of our security services to be able to combat Islamism even harder than before,” she added.
The interior minister also said Berlin would “accelerate deportations more forcefully… and take further measures to reduce illegal migration.”
The new security package envisages a ban on knives at public festivals, sports events and other mass gatherings, with regional authorities given the right to impose similar restrictions in crime hotspots such as train stations.
“The police are getting the [power] to carry out random checks even without suspicion,” Faeser stated.
She also revealed that the authorities would step up measures to prevent extremists from obtaining gun licenses. “In the future, the police, the Federal Criminal Police Office and the Customs Investigation Bureau will be consulted when someone applies for a gun permit.”
Deportations of migrants who have no legal right to stay in Germany will also be expedited. Asylum seekers who are due to be sent back to other EU member states under the Dublin Regulation will also stop receiving benefits in Germany.
A task force comprised of federal and regional authorities will be established to manage deportations more efficiently.
The latest announcements echoed promises made by Chancellor Olaf Scholz during a visit to the site of the attack on Monday. “We must do everything we can to ensure that such things never happen in our country,” he said.