Germany has passed a law prohibiting the arrival of refugee families.
Bundestag (Photo: bundestag.de)

The lower house of the German Bundestag has passed a bill to suspend family reunification for migrants who do not meet the requirements for full refugee status and are granted subsidiary protection. This was reported by Reuters.

The upper house of parliament, the Bundesrat, is expected to approve the bill in July, after which it will come into effect.

According to German Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt, the new law is necessary because Germany's integration capacity, especially in education, childcare and housing, has reached its limit.

"Immigration must have limits, and we are considering this politically," he said.

Dobrindt said that suspending family reunification would help curb illegal migration, where one family member travels to Germany in advance to bring others later.

Currently, Germany hosts approximately 388,000 people with "subsidiary protection status"—a form of international protection granted to individuals who do not meet the requirements for refugee status but who still face a real risk of serious harm if returned to their country of origin. The majority of those with this status are Syrian.

  • On April 15, Merz announced his intention to reduce the number of new asylum seekers in the country to less than 100,000 per year.
  • According to the Central Register of Foreigners, Germany recorded a new record in September 2024: 3.48 million people have refugee status, are asylum seekers, or are candidates who remain in the country due to the impossibility of deportation. This is 60,000 more than at the end of 2023 and is the highest figure since the 1950s.