Doskozil criticizes asylum policy: "System has not changed since 2015"

On the day a refrigerated truck with 71 dead refugees was discovered in a breakdown bay near Parndorf, the then state police director Hans Peter Doskozil visited a refugee support center in Nickelsdorf. Together with the then Minister of the Interior Johanna Mikl-Leitner, he informed himself about the situation at the border – at that time, between 5,000 and 20,000 migrants were arriving in Austria daily.

"We sensed the magnitude"

Shortly after the visit, Doskozil received the news of the gruesome discovery on the A4. "We sensed the magnitude, but did not yet know the scale," he says in retrospect. The idea that 71 people were locked in a confined space and suffocated painfully deeply shook him: "The feeling must have been insane."

As police director, he organized a press conference in Eisenstadt on the same day to inform the public. Doskozil himself was not at the site of the truck discovery near Parndorf. He also followed the recovery of the bodies at a facility in Nickelsdorf from a distance – deliberately, as he emphasizes, since he had no operational role on site. Yet even without direct involvement, the "smell of death" has been deeply etched into his memory: "The smell alone was striking."

Criticism of European and national migration policy

The events of 2015 marked a turning point. In the following weeks, tens of thousands of refugees came to Central Europe via the Balkan route. Austria was only a transit country at that time – stopping or turning them back was practically impossible: "Otherwise, the crowd would have set off on their own."

Despite the dramatic circumstances, Doskozil sees no progress in European migration policy ten years later: "Politically, nothing has happened since then. The system is the same, nothing has changed." Migration occurs in waves, yet the EU has still not managed to establish uniform legal regulations.

He also sharply criticizes the Austrian federal government: Deportations are not consistently carried out, and negative asylum decisions often lead to humanitarian residence after five years. "That's crazy," says Doskozil. Those who disregard the rules of society forfeit the right to asylum – this also applies to repatriations to Syria or Afghanistan.

Demand for Asylum Centers Outside the EU

Doskozil sees a solution in asylum processing centers outside the EU. In his opinion, such a center could have been established in Turkey during the Schengen expansion to include Romania and Bulgaria. "This is the only way to get smuggling under control, because it would no longer make sense."

At the same time, he calls for a fundamental societal debate: "No one has the courage to start the discussion: What does immigration mean for our values and our traditions?" It is about mastering the balancing act between humanitarian aid and maintaining societal norms.

(APA/Red)

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