Austria offers Syrians €1,000 'return bonus' as Europe suspends asylum claims

Austria's government has said it is offering Syrian refugees in the country a 'return bonus' of €1,000 euros to go back to Syria following the collapse of Bashar al-Assad’s regime.

The move comes as several countries across Europe have already begun deliberating what to do with their Syrian refugee populations.

"Austria will support Syrians who wish to return to their home country with a return bonus of 1,000 euros. The country now needs its citizens in order to be rebuilt," Conservative Chancellor Karl Nehammer said in a statement posted in English and German on X.

Nehammer said on the day al-Assad was ousted that the security situation in Syria would be reassessed to determine whether deportations could go ahead.

Deporting people against their will is not possible until the situation in Syria has been deemed safe, so the government, led by the Austrian People’s Party (ÖVP) has said it will focus on voluntary deportations.

Austria has also stopped processing asylum applications filed by Syrians, in line with several other European countries, including Belgium, Denmark, Germany and the Czech Republic.

But all of those countries agree it is too early to consider returning refugees to Syria.

The EU's executive branch, the European Commission, said that currently "the conditions are not met for safe, voluntary, dignified returns to Syria."

"We need to wait a few more days to see where Syria is heading now," German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser said.

"What is the situation? What about the protection of minorities? What about the protection of the people? And then, of course, there could be repatriation."

Syrians make up the largest group of asylum-seekers in Austria and Nehammer, like many conservative leaders across Europe, is under pressure from the far-right to take a tougher stance on immigration.

But what is unclear is how many Syrians in Austria will take up the offer of the return bonus as national flag-carrier Austrian Airlines currently operates no flights to the Middle East because of the volatile security situation so €1,000 may not be sufficient to cover travel via an indirect route.

Nehammer's comments come in the same week that former German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s Health Minister Jens Spahn pitched a similar idea in a TV interview.

"What if the German government said: 'We will charter planes for anyone who wants to go back to Syria, and we will give them €1,000  to get them started'?" he asked.

The arrival in Europe in 2015 of well over one million refugees, most of them fleeing the civil war in Syria, sparked one of the EU’s biggest political crises as nations bickered over who should host them and whether other countries should be forced to help. Those tensions remain even today.

Almost 14,000 Syrians applied for international protection in Europe this year up to September, according to the EU’s asylum agency.

Around 183,000 Syrians applied for asylum in all of last year. On average, around one in three applications are accepted.

The UN's refugee agency has called for "patience and vigilance" in the treatment of Syrians who have sought international protection and believes that much will depend on whether Syria's new leaders are prepared to respect law and order.