And so the authorities of Lower Saxony intend to achieve tougher rules for Germany's admission of late resettlers from the republics of the former USSR. It was with such a decisive statement that the Lower Saxon Minister of the Interior, Social Democrat Heiner Bartling, began his first working week in 2003.
However, writes Russkaya Germania, the minister said nothing new - he has been voicing this idea for quite some time. True, this time the politician accompanied his personal opinion on this matter with a concrete 'recipe': it is proposed to 'equalize in rights' resettlers from the former Soviet Union with Germans from Poland or Romania. Like, let each individual 'Russlanddeutsche' prove with documents that he was persecuted in his country of residence precisely on ethnic grounds.
Well, truly, as the proverb goes: they walked and walked, but started to crawl! There was little worry about the language exam, which, according to the authors of the new immigration law, all members of late resettler families were supposed to take (as is known, on December 18 of last year the Constitutional Court of the Federal Republic of Germany rejected its entry into force), so a new, quite probable 'pleasure' loomed on the horizon. Now, Mr. Bartling proposes to attach to the set of documents submitted for departure to the historical homeland a certificate stating that the applicant for the coveted status is... an enemy of the Russian (Kazakh, Uzbek) and other peoples of the CIS and Baltic countries. I would just like to know: which agency, in his opinion, in these countries would issue such certificates?
The minister's statement provoked an immediate and quite predictable reaction from resettlers living in Hanover. The statements of several dozen people who called me over the past weekend actually boil down to the following. In their opinion, one gets the impression that modern German politicians do not know and do not want to know the history of Russian Germans, their total deportation and life in 'zones of eternal peace.' Yes, those who called told me, no one argues: knowledge of the German language is extremely important for successful integration, but we should not forget that we were all deprived of the opportunity to study our native language in the USSR. It is also criminal to call us 'incapable drug addicts and alcoholics with criminal tendencies.' And we should also not forget through whose fault our grandfathers, grandmothers, fathers and mothers were left to rot in the Soviet labor army. Moreover, dividing citizens of a country by ethnic, religious or any other criterion, including place of birth, clearly smacks of racism.
The Administrative Court of Baden-Württemberg ruled: the declining willingness of late resettlers to use German as their native language reduces their social compatibility with the local population and complicates their relations with indigenous residents. On this basis, the courts refuse to grant the status of late resettlers to those who do not have a sufficient command of the German language. This discriminatory postulate, with the help of which sociologists try to explain the current difficulties of integration of late resettlers, is unlikely to help politicians win the trust of new fellow citizens.
Experts, in turn, explain the reduction in the influx of late resettlers not by a lack of desire to integrate, but by the absence of a mechanism for adapting the 'foreign' relatives of new German citizens to living conditions in their historical homeland.
The situation for resettlers in recent years has indeed become difficult, and to resolve it, a constructive, substantive conversation using specific figures and facts is needed. We should also not forget that in a month there will be state elections, the outcome of which could be decisively influenced by the votes of 'Russian' Germans. So, as they say, happiness and success are in your hands, if you are truly outraged by the minister's statements.