Mayors concerned about Afghan asylum seekers

Eleven mayors have written to immigration minister Gerd Leers expressing their concern about Afghan asylum seekers in their cities who are suspected of war crimes, reports Trouw on Tuesday.


The asylum seekers have been declared ‘undesirable’ by the foreign affairs ministry because they are suspected of being members of the Afghan intelligence agency KhAD/WAD.
However, the mayors, among them Rotterdam’s Ahmed Aboutabel and Maastricht’s Onno Hoes, say many of them have never been to court and have therefore never been found guilty.
They want Leers to stop all deportation procedures against them now that a court in The Hague has said the lack of an individual hearing is ‘unacceptable’.

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