Around ten armed police officers surrounded his parish hall in Bienenbuttel, a tranquil community of 7,000 in Lower Saxony. Police arrested a family from Russia who was hiding there—a couple with an adult son and a 16-year-old daughter.
The family did not want the men to participate in Russia's war against Ukraine, so they applied for asylum in Germany. But according to European law, Spain, not Germany, was responsible for the family, as it was their point of entry to the EU.
For around 40 years, religious institutions in Germany have been offering protection for refugees threatened with deportation. This kind of protection is technically unlawful—but it is usually tolerated by German authorities.
Collection
[
|
...
]