Internal security: Özdemir: "Cityscape" debate is being conducted in a simplistic manner.

Green Party politician Cem Özdemir has criticized the debate surrounding Chancellor Friedrich Merz's "cityscape" comment as "simplistic." "Some are turning a blind eye and pretending we don't have a problem at all, while on the other hand, we have people who give the impression that people with a migration background are responsible for every problem in this country," Özdemir told the Redaktionsnetzwerk Deutschland (RND). The former Federal Minister of Agriculture will be the Green Party's lead candidate in next year's state elections in Baden-Württemberg.

“There are migrant-influenced communities where archaic and patriarchal structures are entrenched, which pose a particular threat to women,” said Özdemir. Similarly, there are places in Germany – especially in parts of eastern Germany – where people with a migration background feel unsafe “because they don’t look like they’re voting directly for the Vikings.”

Debate since mid-October

Özdemir called for greater efforts to improve the sense of security in public spaces. "And this must be done across party lines if we don't want to lose even more people to the AfD. This also includes addressing toxic masculinity and phenomena like crime as a 'lifestyle'," Özdemir said.

The current debate surrounding public safety and migration was sparked by a statement from the Chancellor. In mid-October, he said at an event that the federal government was correcting past failures in migration policy and making progress, "but of course we still have this problem in the cityscape, and that's why the Federal Minister of the Interior is now working to enable and carry out deportations on a very large scale." Only a week later did he become more specific: the problems stemmed from those migrants who lacked permanent residency status, did not work, and did not abide by the rules.