The German newspaper “Main-Post” has reported that a male Chechen asylum seeker attempted suicide in order to prevent his deportation to Poland.

According to the information, on October 18 police officers asked a family of Chechen asylum seekers to pack and get ready for their deportation from the city of Würzburg, Germany to Poland. One member of the family, a 38 year old Chechen man took a knife and started to cut his forearm in front of his pregnant wife and four children. The police grabbed him immediately and the injured Chechen asylum seeker was taken to the hospital by ambulance.

The Chechen family had arrived in Germany during the summer of 2011 through Poland. For this reason, the German Federal Agency for Migration and Refugees (Bundesbehörde für Migration und Flüchtlinge) refused their asylum application, referencing the Dublin-II regulation, which dictates asylum procedures in the European Union (EU). According to the regulation, an asylum application must be considered by the member of the EU in which third-country nationals first crossed the border and entered the EU.

“If we go back to Poland, they will immediately deport us to Russia where my life is in danger. I would rather die here than in Chechnya. Either way my children would not have a father but at least there might be the chance that they could stay here,” said the desperate man who is afraid to give his name.

Johannes Hardenacke, spokesman for the government of the Lower Franconia region, described the suicide attempt as “a little bit of an exaggerated situation”. He claimed that the Chechen man is in good enough health to be deported! However, a local lawyer named Michael Koch described the deportation attempt as “inhumane”. He will attempt to prevent the deportation by appealing to the Administrative Court of Würzburg.

*Text was written by Waynakh Online and edited by Michael Capobianco