Many young men from Afghanistan will remember the name Efringen-Kirchen for the rest of their lives.

Because the illegal refugees are properly registered for the first time in the small registration area of ​​the federal police headquarters in southern Baden, a few kilometers east of the A5 motorway.

They usually have a journey of several months over a good 6,000 kilometers behind them, often accompanied by smugglers.

They are then picked up by units of the Federal Police on the last stretch of their long flight in the ICE from the Basel train station to the Badischer Bahnhof near the border.

Helen Bubrowski

Political correspondent in Berlin.

  • Follow I follow

John Knight

Correspondent for politics and economy in Switzerland.

  • Follow I follow

Rudiger Soldt

Political correspondent in Baden-Württemberg.

  • Follow I follow

When the federal police officers research the Eurodac file, they often find no entry.

Most migrants have not been registered or asked for a passport in any other European country - Croatia, Slovenia, Austria, Switzerland.

Although Switzerland is not an EU country, the Dublin rules apply there too.

Most of the refugees who arrive in Efringen-Kirchen come from Afghanistan, Syria or Turkey.

Illegal migration in southern Baden has skyrocketed.

Until August, the number of illegal entries was in the lower three-digit range.

Sometimes almost 200, sometimes a good 300 people per month came.

The number was already increasing in August, in September the federal police suddenly found 991 unauthorized entries at the German-Swiss border, in October there were 2390 and in November 2916. In November there were also almost 700 people who were apprehended shortly before the border became.

Their attempt at illegal entry was thwarted, which is why they do not appear in the statistics.

There is evidence that it is an evasive movement.

In the first half of the year, the migratory pressure on the so-called Western Balkans route, which leads to the EU via Turkey, North Macedonia and Serbia, increased immensely.

The European agency Frontex recorded a 190 percent increase in migration between January and August.

As a result, the Czech Republic decided at the beginning of September to control the border with Slovakia.

The controls have already been extended twice.

This is why migrants are apparently increasingly taking the route via Slovenia and Austria.

Customs is there, but only checks the movement of goods

The German-Austrian border is monitored by the federal police.

Here, too, the number of illegal crossings has increased, but not exploded like at the German-Swiss border.

In the first half of the year there were between 1000 and 2000 border crossings per month, the peak in October was around 3600, i.e. a tripling instead of a tenfold increase.

In order to escape the controls, a popular route leads from Austria via the Swiss border town of Buchs, a few kilometers west of Vaduz, to Switzerland.

From there it goes on to southern Baden.

A small detour, but apparently worth it.

There are no identity checks at the border between Germany and Switzerland.

Customs officials are there to inspect the movement of goods.