German deportation flight scrapped after Taliban refuse to cooperate

A planned group deportation of men required to leave Germany for Afghanistan, originally scheduled for late May, was cancelled after the Taliban authorities refused to cooperate, sources told dpa on Friday. 

The deportation is to be rescheduled for a later date, though no new date has been set.

It is understood that it had become clear some time before the planned flight date that the deportation would not be able to go ahead. The German states had not yet sent any individuals required to leave to the airport. 

Germany's "Tagesschau" main news programme first reported on the cancelled charter flight following research by regional public broadcaster NDR.

The flight was cancelled after the militant Islamist de facto rulers in Kabul expressed dissatisfaction with what they saw as a lack of willingness to engage on the part of German Foreign Office representatives, dpa learnt.

The Taliban are primarily interested in sending more diplomats to Afghan missions in Germany. Asked whether the Taliban were linking their cooperation on deportations to the dispatch of additional diplomats, a Foreign Office spokesman said he could not comment on the details of talks being conducted by the Foreign Office or the Interior Ministry.

Deportations resumed in 2024 after a pause of more than three years. In August 2024, 28 male offenders were deported from the eastern city of Leipzig to Kabul for the first time since the Taliban takeover three years earlier, with Qatar's assistance.

Germany has since also organized its own deportations to Afghanistan - both individual deportations on scheduled flights and group charters.

Critics argue that the government on the one hand refuses to recognize the Taliban due to their human rights violations - particularly regarding women - while on the other it is working with them in effect and making practical concessions to enable deportations.

These concessions include allowing individual Taliban diplomats to be posted to Afghan missions in Germany, which had previously been staffed exclusively by diplomats appointed by the previous government.

Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt said in November that "criminals and individuals deemed a security threat must be the priority." That does not mean, however, that deportations will be limited exclusively to those two groups in the future, Dobrindt said.