Tuesday, Mar 19, 2024 | Last Update : 02:43 PM IST

  Angela Merkel allies call for ban on Muslim veils

Angela Merkel allies call for ban on Muslim veils

AFP
Published : Sep 9, 2016, 7:11 am IST
Updated : Sep 9, 2016, 7:11 am IST

Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservative Bavarian allies have called for tougher immigration rules in Germany that favour migrants from Europe’s “Christian-occidental cultural sphere”, according to a p

German Chancellor Angela Merkel (Photo: AP)
 German Chancellor Angela Merkel (Photo: AP)

Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservative Bavarian allies have called for tougher immigration rules in Germany that favour migrants from Europe’s “Christian-occidental cultural sphere”, according to a party paper seen by AFP on Thursday.

The CSU party also has demanded a ban on the Muslim full-face and partial-face veils, an end to dual citizenship, iron-clad rules that newcomers socially integrate and learn German and an upper limit of 200,000 asylum seekers a year.

The party — which has long and fervently attacked Ms Merkel’s liberal stance on refugees that welcomed a million asylum seekers into the EU’s top economy last year — plans to present the paper at a meeting starting Friday.

The move comes days after the right-wing populist and anti-immigration Alternative for Germany (AfD) beat Merkel’s party in a state vote, and about a year before Germany expects to hold national elections.

Ms Merkel, whose long-stellar approval ratings have taken a dive amid the refugee crisis, on Wednesday warned all political parties against a race to the bottom where they adopt the xenophobic rhetoric of the anti-Islam AfD.

But her coalition allies the CSU, based in the deeply conservative and mainly Catholic southern Bavaria region, did not pull their punches in the five-page paper.

“Germany must stay Germany,” declared the paper. “We are against our welcoming country being changed through migration and waves of refugees.” A mass influx like the one seen a year ago, when tens of thousands of refugees a day entered Germany through Bavaria, “must under no circumstances be repeated,” it argued. From now, demanded the CSU, Germany must set an upper limit of accepting 200,000 refugees a year .

Location: Germany, Berliini, Berlin