Germany deports 31 Afghans to Kabul, including first non-criminal

Germany deports 31 people to Afghanistan, including for the first time someone without a criminal record. Several hundred people demonstrate at the airport.

Published: 28 July 2026, 17:48

Protest against the deportation to Afghanistan at Leipzig/Halle Airport on July 27, 2026. Photo: Sebastian Willnow/dpa

By Thomas Ruttig

For the first time since the Taliban took power, Germany has deported people to Afghanistan who are neither criminals nor threats. Early Tuesday morning, the deportation plane took off from Leipzig/Halle Airport. According to MDR, the aircraft was scheduled to fly to Kabul via Trabzon in Turkey.

Even before the federal government officially confirmed the flight, details were leaked to the Bild newspaper. According to the report:

• 31 Afghan men were deported.
• These are "overwhelmingly serious and very serious criminals."
• However, the group also includes "one Afghan national subject to deportation who has no criminal conviction."

This was announced by Federal Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt (CSU) to the tabloid.

In addition, three Afghan criminals had already been deported last week, apparently using scheduled flights. This brings the total number of Afghans deported by the black-red federal government to the Taliban to 204.

The Bavarian Refugee Council called the deportation to Kabul a new "taboo breach." Pro Asyl had previously spoken of "unbounded deportations."

Deal with the Taliban

The flight on Tuesday morning is the sixth German collective deportation since the Taliban regained power in August 2021. The first was carried out by the traffic light coalition government; the following five were conducted by the black-red coalition.

The basis for the deportations is an agreement with the Taliban regime, the details of which are unknown, from early 2026. It was negotiated in Kabul by officials from the Federal Ministry of the Interior and supplemented in June. The deal is said to allow collective deportations to Kabul via charter flight to be "massively ramped up" to up to three such flights per month, as the BMI has confirmed.

Last week, a decree from the Hessian Ministry of the Interior made public a communication from the Federal Police to the federal states from early July that lifts the previous restriction on deportations to criminals and threats. The decree instructed authorities responsible for deportations to review ongoing deportation procedures by July 20 and report "other persons who may be considered thereafter."

At the same time, according to the federal government, the previously existing criteria – "male, adult, single, and subject to enforceable deportation order" – remain in place. The federal government is thus beginning to implement what it announced in its coalition agreement: resuming deportations to Afghanistan, "starting with criminals and threats," which already implied that it would not stop with these groups.

Protests Against the Deportation

Meanwhile, seven federal states declared their willingness to go along with the expansion of deportations:

• Brandenburg
• Saxony-Anhalt
• Saxony
• Thuringia
• Hesse
• Rhineland-Palatinate
• Saarland

Almost everywhere, CDU-led coalitions govern there, with the exception of Brandenburg (red-black coalition) and the SPD single-party government in Saarbrücken. Other federal states – including the previous main deporters to Afghanistan, Bavaria and Baden-Württemberg – apparently did not consider it necessary to issue a corresponding statement.

According to MDR, the plane in Leipzig/Halle was parked in a spot that was difficult to see. The reason was apparently that an anti-racist alliance had called for protests. On late Monday evening, 260 people took part, moving under heavy police escort to the airport's departure hall.

A spokesperson for the alliance told MDR: "While Islamist violence in connection with the CSD is condemned from all sides...