Austria’s Chancellor Sebastian Kurz does not want to accept refugees from Afghanistan. The country is currently home to over 40,000 Afghans.
Vienna (dpa) – Austria’s Chancellor Sebastian Kurz (ÖVP) does not want to grant protection to any further refugees from the country, despite the radical Islamic Taliban taking power in Afghanistan. “I do not think that we should take in more people in Austria, on the contrary,” Kurz said in the summer talk with the television station Puls 4. The interview will be broadcast on Sunday evening. With currently over 40,000 Afghans, Austria is home to the second largest Afghan community in the EU in terms of its own population.
He consistently ruled out the admission of further Afghans. “That won’t happen under my chancellorship,” said Kurz. He also referred to the “particularly difficult integration” of the population group. “Taking in people who cannot then be integrated is a huge problem for us as a country,” said Kurz.
For a while, there is no dispute that the Taliban are cruel and that living conditions in Afghanistan are terrible. The head of government therefore pleaded for the international community to do everything possible to improve the situation in the crisis country. However, Austria also has to admit that a lot is in strange hands. “Everything is not in our power.”
In an interview with Puls 4, Kurz repeated the suggestion that people from Afghanistan should be helped in neighboring countries. He particularly highlighted Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. The EU should support countries in the region in this regard.
