Erfurt (dpa/th) - The Thuringian Commissioner for Integration, Migration and Refugees has criticized the sluggish work on the agreed federal humanitarian admission program for people from Afghanistan. "Members of the Hazara are being systematically persecuted and murdered by the Taliban in Afghanistan," said Mirjam Kruppa in Erfurt on Friday. In order to protect at least some of the people who are particularly at risk, "humanitarian admission programs are finally needed". The traffic light coalition had agreed on an admission program for those in need of protection from Afghanistan in its coalition agreement.
The Taliban have been back in power since August 2021. Just last Friday, 53 schoolchildren died in an attack on a school in the Dashte Barchi district, which is mostly populated by the Shiite Hazara. 110 others were injured. The attack caused great horror among Afghans inside and outside the country. At first no one claimed responsibility for the crime. The Sunni terrorist militia Islamic State (IS) had committed similar bloody deeds in the past.
People from the Hazara ethnic group living in Thuringia contacted them almost every day, worried about the lives of their relatives in Afghanistan, Kruppa said. "The least we can do is open a door to salvation."
