Armin-Paulus Hampel, August 25, 2021, Afghanistan

German Bundestag, Plenarprotokoll 19/238, pp. 31015-31016.

Herr President. Right honorable ladies and gentlemen. Dear viewers at the screens.

Frau Chancellor Rabbit – I cannot designate you otherwise – , the story, which you today have here delivered to us, tops all that up to now you have told in other fairy tales.  

Nothing understood in 20 long years, 20 long years in which you have forgotten all that experts have observed and opined of Afghanistan. After 20 years, you then arrive at positing questions which for 20 years many experts in this country were able to answer for you and were able to bring you to the correct conclusions.

It began with the Americans’ decision to enthrone the Gucci Pashtun Karzai…with falsified elections which were carried out with falsified ballots, with an enthroned parliament which no Afghan understood; and with a constitution which no one at all could understand, it continued.

After that came the catastrophe which occasioned the words of my friend Peter Scholl-Latour when he then visited me at the ARD studio in Kabul – I believe it was 2006 – : Dear Paul, what we have staged here in the Hindukush will end in tragedy. Thus Peter Scholl-Latour, already in 2006, Frau Chancellor, a man to whom many Germans had listened. In this house, he was often smiled at and derided.

So as to similarly clear up another fairy tale: Not only the governing coalition but also you of the FDP and the Greens have always happily added your votes, although there were long since stories which depicted the truth of Afghanistan and the situation of the coalition troops. All of you added your votes.

This morning in the breakfast television we have heard from the chairmen of the Bundeswehr associations that we only still have an observer’s role and are no more an active player. Herr Foreign Minister, who in this Federal Republic of Germany is no more an active player, and by reason of the many failures he has made cannot negotiate eye to eye with other nations, can from Afghanistan draw only one consequence and immediately submit his resignation. In this house, all other is unacceptable…

You now arrive with deceptive packaging in your motion, Frau Chancellor, in which you have us believe we want to let enter only sought-after circles of persons. No, you say quite concretely: We want designated persons, including especially Afghan civilians requiring protection. – The Foreign Minister has today stated: It should be with all who once in any form had to do with Germany or with Germans. – This opens the sluices, ladies and gentlemen. On that account, we will not vote in favor of your motion, but abstain. Some hold back differently. – Respect for your conduct.

Alexander Lambsdorff (FDP): Like the Linke party! The horseshoe theory lives! An additional proof!

This is the point why we reject your motion: You want to open the sluices. You indeed grandly say: 2015 should not be repeated. – Yet you create the pre-requisites so that it does repeat. You quite knowingly want to bring a great number of people to Germany. That, ladies and gentlemen, my AfD delegation rejects. Not again 2015! Recovery for those who are there in secure countries of origin, but no sluicing program to Germany.

Bring the people to security, that is important!

Thank you, Frau President.

 

[trans: tem]

 

 

Armin-Paulus Hampel, August 20, 2021, Afghan Refugees

AfD Kompakt, August 20, 2021. 

The policy in Germany, and foremost of all the still Foreign Minister Maas, administer and discuss the consequences of their failed Afghanistan policy in an unspeakable and unprofessional manner. With a wringing of hands, the guilty will be sought so as to deflect their own responsibility. The U.S.A., on the contrary, makes facts. The U.S. foreign minister Blinken and his deputy Frau Nuland have thus now successfully flown out initially almost solely their own citizens.

The Afghan local auxiliaries [Ortskräfte] shall then follow, if that will still be possible. Dozens of states in the Balkans and Africa, among which are for example Kosovo, Albania or Uganda, were requested for days and with success to accept Afghans, at least for a time. It will be seen how long this “for a time” lasts; since the U.S.A. will very precisely test whom they actually let into their country. It is thereby clear that, even under U.S. President Biden, the U.S.A. consistently pursues its own national interests: America First! And it is obvious where then the Afghans stranded in the Balkans will ultimately want to go: In the European Union and to Germany. And that is to be prevented!

 

[trans: tem]

 

 

Armin-Paulus Hampel, August 11, 2021, Afghanistan

AfD Kompakt, August 11, 2021.

Comes what must come. To recognize that, no secret service reports need be studied. The Taliban conquer one city after another and they will sooner or later capture Kabul. If Herr Röttgen (CDU) really thinks that this may still be prevented militarily, then he is living in another world and with his remarks he has placed himself on the off-sides of foreign policy. It will be the task of the great neighbors Russia, China and India to work out a solution of the conflict in Afghanistan, yet certainly not of the the West or indeed of Germany.

More important than observing the sad developments there is to direct a look at the foreseeable consequences for Germany and Europe and to act prudently. There will be new streams of refugees, and experts thereby figure that the number of Afghan migrants in Turkey could grow to a million by the end of the year. Of these, the majority might attempt to come to Europe and to Germany. It is thus right that the six EU countries Germany, Austria, the Netherlands, Denmark, Belgium and Greece, in a letter to the EU, urge further deportations to Afghanistan. The AfD delegation in the German Bundestag also demands of the Federal government to remain hard against domestic resistance and to clearly reject the criticism of Luxembourg Foreign Minister Asselborn of this conduct. Continued deportations of those Afghans who do not belong here are the correct signal so as to prevent a new 2015.

Yet in parallel we expect of our Foreign Ministry that the previous contacts with the Taliban in Qatar now in fact prove to be reliable and that guarantees for the migrants deported from Germany will be demanded. They should be able to return to their homeland, unharmed and secure from persecution. German diplomacy has corresponding incentives for the future powers in Kabul; namely, the continued and future financial support of Afghanistan promised by the Federal government.

 

[trans: tem]