Wir Schaffen Das: Angela Merkel and Germany's Response to the Refugee Crisis in Europe

On August 24, 2015, Angela Merkel, chancellor of Germany, and Francois Hollande, president of France, met in Berlin to discuss solutions to what had become known as the European refugee crisis. The vast influx of refugees was the result of thousands from Syria, Afghanistan, and Iraq leaving their war torn countries to travel across the Mediterranean Sea or overland to seek refuge in European Union (EU) countries. The crisis had been building since the beginning of the year, leaving some countries-particularly those at the EU borders-overwhelmed with refugees. In the meantime the Bundesamt für Migration und Flüchtlinge (BAMF), Germany's Federal Office for Migration and Refugees, announced it had ratified an order suspending the Dublin convention, a 1990 protocol which forced refugees to apply for asylum in the first EU member country in which they set foot. "Germany will become the member state responsible for processing their claims," a government statement said of the refugees, largely from Syria. As a result, Germany quickly became the first-choice destination for Syrians. Word of Merkel's suspension of the Dublin protocol spread quickly among refugees-Syrian and otherwise-who were heading to the EU or already waiting in camps. Indeed, Hungary's ambassador to Germany, Peter Györkös, later claimed that on August 26, Serbian police found thousands of discarded passports on their side of the border. "From that moment on, every refugee was a Syrian," he told The Guardian.

• Government policy and regulation
• Crisis management
• Management
• Leadership