Authorities Begin Investigations About Visa Affairs Surrounding Foreign Ministry in Germany

Public prosecutors in Berlin and Cottbus have begun their investigation on Foreign Office officials, who were accused of pressuring colleagues to issue visas to applicants despite the latter not meeting the requirements or even presenting fake documents. 

Recently, it was reported that German officials were accused of pressuring embassies to issue Schengen visas to applicants from Ethiopia, with the Foreign Ministry led by Annalena Baerbock being targeted, Schengen.News reports. 

Similar cases have occurred with the German embassy in Islamabad, where officials were pressured into granting visas to a young Afghan national despite his passport was not valid. 

More Accusations Regarding Visa Issuance Have Been Evident at the German Foreign Ministry Recently 
The embassy officials have raised concerns that people whom they were pressured to issue visas to can apply for asylum, which indicates that their purpose was not just entering Germany but also remaining in the country. 

That was the case with one of the Ethiopian nationals, who filed for asylum in Nuremberg while being on a short-stay visa. 

In addition, the Foreign Ministry was accused of nepotism, with the local media reporting in August that a person who is the wife of a high-ranking official at the Ministry had been given tasks by this authority and executing them as well as giving courses to the embassy staff responsible for making visa decisions. 

The Ministry did not comment on the matter but later on went to confirm that some officials were currently under investigation. Reports also suggested that the foreign nationals who were issued visas on false documents could be foreign secret agents.

Germany Highly Alerted About National Security 
In recent years, Germany, as well as Europe, has been under high pressure from security threats, as many cases of terrorism have been recorded. 

The most recent has occurred in Magdeburg, Germany, where five people died and 200 were injured after a person drove into a crowd at a Christmas market. The attacker was a Saudi-born psychiatrist, who already had a record of disputes with state authorities and, German authorities had been warned about him in the past. 

The man was self-described as a Saudi atheist and had helped women flee Gulf countries in the past. He was a supporter of far-right conspiracy theories about the “Islamisation” of Europe. 

Even acquaintances of the arrested person had revealed that he had terrorised them for years, with some labelling him as “a psychopath who adheres to ultra-right conspiracy ideologies,” as The Guardian reported. 

Source: https://schengen.news/authorities-begin-investigations-about-visa-affairs-surrounding-foreign-ministry-in-germany/