German Chancellor Olaf Scholz defended his government’s migration policy in remarks to parliament on Wednesday morning and emphasized the county’s need to attract skilled foreigners.
“There is no country in the world with a shrinking working population that has economic growth. That is the truth we are confronted with,” Scholz said in the Bundestag, as Germany’s parliament is known.
His remarks come amid tense, acrimonious debate in Berlin over migration and asylum policy. On Tuesday evening, cross-party talks between Scholz’s coalition and the centre-right opposition collapsed with bitter criticism.
Migration policy has been the dominant topic in political debate since a knife-wielding assailant killed three people and wounded eight others last month in the western German city of Solingen.
The suspected attacker is a 26-year-old Syrian man who had evaded an order to be deported from Germany to Bulgaria, where he was first registered in the European Union.
Scholz on Wednesday stressed the need to remain open to immigration in Germany while also properly managing and controlling arrivals.
“We are a country that offers protection to those who are politically persecuted, who are running for their lives, who have to save their lives, and that is in our constitution and we are not putting that up for debate,” said Scholz.
“Openness to the world is therefore necessary. But openness to the world does not mean that anyone who wants to can come. We must be able to choose who comes to Germany. I say that quite explicitly here,” the chancellor added.
