Germany's interior minister said Thursday that the number of people turned back at the country’s borders increased by nearly half in the new government’s first week in office after it stepped up police checks at its frontiers, and that those rejected included asylum-seekers.
The government under Chancellor Friedrich Merz, who made tougher migration policy a central plank of his campaign for Germany’s election in February, took office on May 6. The following day, Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt said more police would be stationed at the border to curb irregular migration and some asylum-seekers trying to enter Europe’s biggest economy would be turned away.
