German frontrunner vows permanent border controls after knife attack

The far-right opposition leader expected to lead Germany in next month’s election has promised sweeping changes to border and security laws after a group of children were stabbed to death in Bavaria.

Friedrich Merz has promised to close Germany’s borders to all migrants, including those with asylum rights.

A two-year-old boy from Morocco and a 41-year-old man were killed in Wednesday’s attack in Aschaffenburg, and several others were injured.

A 28-year-old Afghan man was due to appear in court on Thursday charged with murder and grievous bodily harm.

Wednesday’s stabbing in Aschaffenburg is the latest in a series of violent and deadly attacks on suspected asylum seekers in Germany.

Within hours, the stabbing prompted Chancellor Olaf Scholz to make a strong statement as well as Merz, the centre-right opposition leader.

Scholz promised swift action and called it a “threat” – although authorities have so far not said they believe there is a terrorist attack.

Merz, whose Christian Democrats lead the polls ahead of the February 23 elections, refused to admit that the attacks in Mannheim last May, Solingen in August and Magdeburg last month, would be “new”.

The Afghan suspect in yesterday’s attack arrived in Germany in 2022 and has been linked to three previous attacks, according to Bavarian authorities. He agreed to leave Germany last month but was still receiving psychiatric treatment and living in a shelter.

The investigating judge will decide whether he should be imprisoned or committed to a mental institution.

Merz said on his first day as chancellor he would instruct the interior ministry to permanently control Germany’s borders.

“We are seeing before our eyes the ruins of 10 years of bad immigration and immigration laws in Germany,” he said. “We have reached the limit.”

Under her party colleague, Angela Merkel, Germany welcomed more than a million refugees during the European crisis of 2015-16.

Criticizing EU law as “ineffective”, he said Germany should “exercise its right to follow national law”.

Germany has already reintroduced checks at its borders to deal with illegal immigration, which is temporarily allowed under the EU’s borderless Schengen rules as a “last resort” measure, but not permanently.

Merz also said the time has come to significantly increase the amount of land that is built before evictions.

Merz’s promise to crack down on illegal documents on his first day in the chancellery in Berlin has a Trumpian ring to it.

The US president said He pushed for a group of major laws and actions to crack down on illegal immigration since he re-entered the White House this week.

In Germany, the left-wing chancellor Merz knows that the Alternative for Germany (AfD), which has been in the second round of voting, has made signing a challenge.

AfD leader Alice Weidel has called for a vote in Germany’s parliament next week to close Germany’s borders and return migrants. “The knife attack in Aschaffenburg must have consequences,” he said on TV.

Some critics would argue that Scholz and Merz’s move to become stronger now comes too late. Some would argue that the right-wing reform of the main parties would only strengthen the AfD’s arguments.

In any case, German politics does not agree with the president’s plan for the first day, considering the need to form alliances with other parties.

The leader of the liberal Free Democratic Party, Christian Lindner, said that Merz would not be able to show change if he entered into a coalition with the Social Democrats or the Green Party.

Nancy Faeser, who is the minister of the interior and a partner of Olaf Scholz’s party, said that “some people are now making nonsense of the election”.

“I can clearly warn that we should not misuse such an evil practice against people, which only benefits right-wing people and insults people,” he said.

A 41-year-old man who was killed in a stabbing on Wednesday is being praised, apparently for coming to the aid of a group of kindergarteners and saving the lives of other children.

A two-year-old girl from Syria suffered knife wounds to her neck.

A 72-year-old man was severely stabbed and a kindergarten teacher suffered a broken arm.