The number of asylum seekers in Berlin has risen significantly this year, and thousands of war refugees from Ukraine arrive in the German capital every month.

The city is trying to get the situation under control with emergency shelters and temporary housing.

Markus Wehner

Political correspondent in Berlin.

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The Governing Mayor expects many more refugees in the coming year.

"You have to be prepared for the fact that people flee to us and the numbers continue," said Franziska Giffey (SPD) of the German Press Agency.

The city now wants to try to significantly increase the number of accommodation places.

It is being checked whether the International Congress Center ICC, which is currently empty, can be used for this.

The former congress building, which belongs to the state of Berlin and whose future use has been the subject of debate for years, was used as a first point of contact for refugees in 2016/17.

According to Giffey, it is also possible to build temporary buildings, as is already happening in the arrival center for refugees at the former Tegel Airport.

Refugees from Ukraine arrive there.

Actually, they should only be registered there and - if they are not distributed to other federal states - not stay there for more than two to three days until they get a place to live in Berlin.

Currently, 230 Ukrainians arrive in Berlin every day

In fact, it often takes several weeks, during which they sleep in bunk beds and have to live between partition walls.

There are now more than 2,000 people in Tegel who are staying there for several weeks because the city cannot find accommodation any faster.

According to Giffey, an average of 230 refugees from Ukraine arrive in Berlin every day.

Overall, the city provided first aid to 360,000 people from Ukraine in the past year.

About 100,000 of them stayed in Berlin, about 80,000 already have a residence permit.

Lightweight halls are of course “not a permanent solution” to accommodate refugees, Giffey admits.

The city is therefore also preparing "modular residential buildings", but their construction takes a year and can therefore not provide a quick remedy;

the first of these buildings are scheduled to be completed by the end of 2023.

Therefore, according to the SPD politician, Berlin is still dependent on emergency accommodation, such as at the former Tempelhof Airport.

Shortly before Christmas, accommodation for 840 refugees was opened in former hangars.

Serious problems in the reception center

However, it is by no means only the refugees from Ukraine whose housing poses major challenges for Berlin.

Added to this is the increase in asylum seekers.

According to the Berlin State Office for Refugees (LAF), a good 7,700 asylum seekers were registered in 2021; in the first eleven months of this year there were already more than 12,300.

In the initial reception center for asylum seekers in Berlin-Reinickendorf there is a traffic jam at the registration, it is now 1800 people.

In addition, there seem to be problems with the security service.

Employees have been accused of things ranging from blackmail and coercion to forced prostitution.

Social Senator Katja Kipping (Die Linke) promised clarification.

According to the Senate, Berlin has so far created almost 30,000 accommodation places;

Kipping has announced that up to 10,000 more will be added by the end of the year.

However, it is difficult to predict how the numbers will develop.

According to Giffey, that also depends on the course of the war in Ukraine.

Admittedly, many Ukrainians wanted to hold out in their homeland during the winter.

"But when bombs fall, they go," says the Governing Mayor.