SHAFAQNA- Denmark is the first European country to tell large numbers of Syrian refugees to go home. While it hasn’t begun deportations, nearly 400 Syrians from in and around the capital, Damascus, have been stripped of their residency permits and the right to work since 2019. They are under increasing pressure, and hundreds have left Denmark in search of refuge in other EU countries.
The Danish government – which has taken one of the hardest lines on asylum and migration in Europe in recent years – justified its decision by saying there had been a decline in armed conflict in Damascus and its surrounding suburbs, thenewhumanitarian reported.
The decision to revoke residency permits dovetails with a broader trend of countries across Europe implementing hard-line policies to block access to asylum and erode protections. Nearly 11 years after the war in Syria began, advocates and rights groups worry that Denmark’s decision is also a sign of what’s to come as more and more European countries choose to focus on the reduction in armed conflict when calibrating their asylum policies .