An asylum-seeker who was wrongfully deported from Germany to Afghanistan was flown back to Berlin on Sunday, according to the federal police.



His case was the latest in a series of deportation mishaps in Germany.

The 20-year-old Afghan man was one of 69 people deported on a charter flight from Munich at the start of July. The man, whose initial asylum request was rejected in April 2017, had been waiting on a decision on his appeal before an administrative court in the German town of Greifswald, and should not legally have been deported.

His case came to light two weeks after the deportation. The Federal Office for Migration and Refugees (BAMF) has admitted there was a "procedural error."

"I'm happy to be back in Germany. I hope I may stay here, and I thank you for your great support," the man, identified under Germany's privacy laws only as Nasibullah S., told Norddeutscher Rundfunk shortly after his arrival at Berlin's Tegel Airport.

Watch video 02:34 Share Living with the threat of deportation Send Facebook google+ Whatsapp Tumblr linkedin stumble Digg reddit Newsvine Permalink https://p.dw.com/p/2ztAF Building a life despite deportation threat

Other recent cases of wrongful deportation

The accused bin Laden body guard

Islamist Sami A. was deported to his native Tunisia in July after nearly two decades in Germany. He was accused of once being a bodyguard to Osama bin Laden. But German law forbids deportation to countries where people may face torture or abuse. A faxed order blocking his deportation was overlooked and he was sent to Tunisia where authorities refused to send him back. On Monday, however, the Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger reported authorities had issued a re-entry ban on the Tunisian. The responsible immigration office in Bochum reportedly issued a tender to block European Schengen states from granting entry to the man on security grounds.

Read more: Tunisians, Germans split over deportation of suspected bin Laden bodyguard

The Ukrainian carer

Ukrainian aged-carer Svitlana K. and her family from the war-ridden city of Donetsk were deported in July. But a judge later overturned this ruling on the basis that she was midway through a training course on aged-care. Germany is facing a drastic shortage of carers.

Read more: 'Who will look after us?' — Germany's ailing elderly care system

The Chinese Uighur

In April, a 22-year-old asylum-seeker from China was wrongfully deported after a faxed court ruling failed to reach local authorities in Bavaria. His lawyer later said he had not heard from his client since his deportation. A member of the mostly Muslim Uighur minority, he faces cultural and religious repression.



Read more: Germany expels Uighur asylum seeker to China 'in error'

The Afghan soldier

In December, a 24-year-old Afghan identified as Haschmatullah F. was brought back to Germany after being wrongfully deported three months earlier. He said he was threatened by the Taliban and almost killed because he worked with the Americans as a soldier. On his return, a court granted him a three-year residence permit and permission to work in Germany.

aw/cmk (dpa, AFP, Reuters, AP, epd)

Deportations from Germany to Afghanistan By the planeload On September 12, 2017, a flight left Germany's Düsseldorf airport for Afghanistan, carrying 15 rejected asylum seekers in what is the first group deportation to the country since a deadly car bomb blast near the German embassy in Kabul in late May. The opposition Greens and Left party slammed the resumption of deportations to Afghanistan as "cynical."

Deportations from Germany to Afghanistan Fighting for a chance In March 2017, high school students in Cottbus made headlines with a campaign to save three Afghan classmates from deportation. They demonstrated, collected signatures for a petition and raised money for an attorney to contest the teens' asylum rejections - safe in the knowledge that their friends, among them Wali (above), can not be deported as long as proceedings continue.

Deportations from Germany to Afghanistan 'Kabul is not safe' "Headed toward deadly peril," this sign reads at a demonstration in Munich airport in February. Protesters often show up at German airports where the deportations take place. Several collective deportations left Germany in December 2016, and between January and May 2017. Protesters believe that Afghanistan is too dangerous for refugees to return.

Deportations from Germany to Afghanistan From Würzburg to Kabul Badam Haidari, in his mid-30s, spent seven years in Germany before he was deported to Afghanistan in January 2017. He had previously worked for USAID in Afghanistan and fled the Taliban, whom he still fears years later – hoping that he will be able to return to Germany after all.

Deportations from Germany to Afghanistan Persecuted minorities In January of the same year, officials deported Afghan Hindu Samir Narang from Hamburg, where he had lived with his family for four years. Afghanistan, the young man told German public radio, "is not safe." Minorities from Afghanistan who return because asylum is denied face religious persecution in the Muslim country. Deportation to Afghanistan is "life-threatening" to Samir, says change.org.

Deportations from Germany to Afghanistan Reluctant returnees Rejected asylum seekers deported from Germany to Kabul, with 20 euros in their pockets from the German authorities to tide them over at the start, can turn to the International Organization for Migration (IOM) for assistance. Funded by the German Foreign Office, members of the IPSO international psychosocial organization counsel the returnees. Author: Dagmar Breitenbach



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