| Russian Federation: German court rules
against deporting Chechyan refugees KASSEL, Germany, Feb 2, 2006 (AFP) - Germany is not allowed to send Chechyan refugees back home if they risk being persecuted by the Russian authorities, the administrative court of Hessen in central Germany ruled on Thursday. The court in Kassel ruled that if returnees' safety in the rebel province could not be assured, the German authorities had to allow the refugees to remain in Germany and to consider them asylym seekers. It noted that returning Chechyan refugees were often suspected by the Russian forces of being terrorists and were therefore denied their civil rights. According to the German immigration authorities, some 40 percent of the 1,719 Russian asylum seekers that came to Germany in 2005, were from Chechnya, where an 11-year-old conflict with Russian forces still simmers. German Chancellor Angela Merkel on visit to Moscow last month took President Vladimir Putin to task about the situation in Chechnya, saying: "We have discussed subjects on which we don't share the same opinion, notably on Chechnya and the North Caucasus." bur-ef/afm AFP Copyright (c) 2006 Agence France-Presse Received by NewsEdge Insight: 02/02/2006 14:18:28 http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/RWB.NSF/db900SID/ABES-6LMRSL?OpenDocument&rc=4&emid=ACOS-635PN7 |