Merkel’s Legacy is in Tatters

Azeem Ibrahim OBE | 30th June 2026 | Comment, International

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A confident and beaming Merkel once encouraged the German people to welcome Syrians and others fleeing war in the Middle East and Africa. “Wir schaffen das”, she cheered, we can do it! A proud German population was, on the whole, behind her humanitarian mission, especially at a time when German industry was on the lookout for as many fresh workers as it could get.

In late August 2015, Germany suspended the EU’s Dublin rules for Syrians, failed to close the Balkan route, and signalled that those who reached German soil could claim asylum there. Within months, the numbers surged: Germany ultimately registered about 890,000 arrivals that year, having first tallied roughly 1.1 million entries before correcting for double counts. The humanitarian intent was sincere.

Ten years later, the system that had underpinned freedom of movement is now hedged with emergency measures. Multiple Schengen states have re-introduced internal border checks, citing irregular migration and security threats; Germany, France, Austria, Denmark, Italy, the Netherlands, Slovenia, Sweden and Poland are among those with controls in place, all extending checks into 2026 alongside Berlin. Meanwhile, the EU’s long-delayed Entry/Exit System, biometric registration for non-EU visitors, begun in October, a bureaucratic proof that the age of easy crossings is over.

“The long-term consequences are global: seeing …

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