A decision by the Higher Administrative Court of Berlin and Brandenburg, which cannot be appealed, could thwart the plans of hundreds of Russian citizens to seek asylum in Germany to escape the law or military conscription.
According to critics, the decision effectively adopts the Kremlin's point of view. The case on which the court ruled has no direct connection to the war in Ukraine. It concerns a 22-year-old criminal Chechen with Russian citizenship, appealing the authorities' decision to deport him from Germany to Russia.
The specific case
The Chechen-born Russian has lived in Germany since 2012. and was sentenced to two years and nine months in prison, where he also committed another crime - physical violence against another prisoner. The court acknowledged that conscripts from Chechnya could indeed be sent to the zone of what the Kremlin calls a "special military operation", for example as part of "volunteer battalions", but at the same time pointed out that a Chechen deported from Germany is not obliged to settle in Chechnya at all, but can choose to live in any region of Russia at his discretion.
The court acknowledged that he could be called up for basic military service in Russia, but cited a number of reasons why this did not justify protection from deportation. For example, it pointed out that there is currently no evidence that Russian conscripts are participating in combat operations in Ukraine. They are mainly deployed as guards on the borders with Ukraine and in Crimea. Since this is a decision of the highest court, which regulates the work of state bodies in two German federal states at the same time and is not subject to appeal, it could become a model for other courts.
However, Robin Wagener, the German government's coordinator for cooperation with Moldova, the South Caucasus and Central Asia, sharply criticized the court's decision. He believes that anyone who wants to avoid serving in the Russian army should have the right to protection in Germany.
What do human rights activists say?
Russian human rights activists recall that this is not the first decision by a German court that is based on outdated data about what is happening in Russia. Artem Kliga, head of the legal department of the Movement for Conscientious Objection to Military Service, points out that there have already been more than ten such court decisions in Germany.
„The law enforcement practice in Germany, unfortunately, has been very late in understanding what is happening in Russia. The time when it could be said that conscripts are not in danger of being sent to war is already in the past. After the start of hostilities in the Kursk region, conscripts from other regions began to be transferred there,“ recalls Kliga.
Alexei Kozlov, a human rights activist from the Berlin organization “Solidarity“, nevertheless says that Russians who evade military service are not threatened with rapid deportation, because the German authorities first expel people who have committed criminal offenses.
Kozlov also points out that it is possible to avoid military service without leaving the borders of Russia - if a person does not live at the place of his address registration and ignores summonses to report to the military recruitment center. "If a person, being in Russia, does not want to be drafted into the army, in 90% of cases he succeeds," the human rights activist claims.
The number of deportations from Germany to Russia is increasing
The decision of the Higher Administrative Court of Berlin and Brandenburg comes against the backdrop of the increasing number of deportations of Russians from Germany. For example, in the first eight months of 2024, 32 people were deported to Russia - four times more than in the previous year.
Official documents show that Russians are being expelled from Germany through "third countries". German police officers escort them to transfer airports, which are not specified by name, but it is assumed that these are Belgrade and Istanbul, from where flights to Russia are made. As of the end of August 2024, 5,381 Russian men between the ages of 18 and 45 had applied for asylum in Germany. Of these, only 57 were approved.
Authors: Vladimir Esipov | Silvia Stöber ARD