Study: Ozempic might lower risk of opioid overdose

By Dennis Thompson, HealthDay News


In a finding that suggests Ozempic and Wegovy have powers that extend beyond weight loss, a new study finds the medications might also lower people's risk of opioid overdose. Photo by Adobe Stock/HealthDay News

In a finding that suggests Ozempic and Wegovy have powers that extend beyond weight loss, a new study finds the medications might also lower people's risk of opioid overdose.

People with Type 2 diabetes prescribed semaglutide (Ozempic, Wegovy) had a significantly lower risk of an opioid OD than patients taking any of eight other diabetic medications, researchers found.

The results show "semaglutide as a possible new treatment for combating this terrible [opioid] epidemic," said lead researcher Rong Xu, a biomedical informatics professor at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland.

For the study, researchers analyzed six years of medical data for nearly 33,000 patients with opioid use disorder who also had Type 2 diabetes.

The data found that those prescribed semaglutide were less likely to suffer from an opioid overdose.

The new study was published Wednesday in the journal JAMA Network Open.

If this effect is confirmed in clinical trials, semaglutide could provide a new means of protecting people suffering from opioid addiction, Xu said in a university news release.

About 107,500 people died from drug ODs in 2023 in the United States, mainly from opioids, researchers said in background notes. About 72% of drug ODs involve opioids.

Only about a quarter of people with opioid addiction are taking effective medicines to prevent overdoses, and half discontinue treatment within six months, researchers said.

"Not everyone receives or responds to them," Xu said. "As a result, alternative medications to help people treat opioid use disorder and prevent overdosing are crucial."

Dr. Sandeep Kapoor is vice president of emergency medicine addiction services at Northwell and is based in New Hyde Park, N.Y. He wasn't involved in the new study. However, he called its findings preliminary but "extremely promising."

According to Kapoor, it makes sense that medications such as Ozempic curb opioid overuse, because the drugs target the brain's dopamine reward system to help folks lose weight.

That's "the same system that's activated when we drink, when there's utilization of drugs," he explained.

Kapoor said it's encouraging "to see a study come out where a medication that has been widely used over the last few years to help folks with Type 2 diabetes, as well as with obesity, potentially play a role in decreasing opioid overdoses. It's actually a very exhilarating and innovative approach that we should investigate further."

Still, he noted that semaglutide has not yet been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to help treat opioid use disorder.

Nevertheless, the study "does legitimize the need to find better treatment alternatives for individuals that are either dealing with an opioid use disorder or at risk of an opioid use disorder," he added.

More information

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has more on treatment of opioid use disorder.

Copyright © 2024 HealthDay. All rights reserved.

The promise of 'Lithium Valley': Who will benefit in one of California's poorest regions?

By Manuel Pastor, USC Dornslife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences

Chris Benner, University of California, Santa Cruz

 THE CONVERSATION

09/28/24

A prototype for CTR’s lithium-producing geothermal facility, in the Hell’s Kitchen area of Imperial Valley. Photo by Manuel Pastor

Imperial County consistently ranks among the most economically distressed places in California. Its Salton Sea, the state's biggest and most toxic lake, is an environmental disaster. And the region's politics have been dominated by a conservative White elite, despite its supermajority Latino population.

The county also happens to be sitting on enough lithium to produce nearly 400 million batteries, sufficient to completely revamp the American auto fleet to electric propulsion. Even better, that lithium could be extracted in a way consistent with broader goals to reduce pollution.

The traditional ways to extract lithium involve either hard rock mining, which generates lots of waste, or large evaporation ponds, which waste a lot of water. In Imperial Valley, companies are pioneering a third method. They are extracting the mineral from the underground briny water brought up during geothermal energy production and then injecting that briny water back into the ground in a closed loop. It promises to yield the cleanest, greenest lithium on the planet.

The hope of a clean energy future has excited investors and public officials so much that the area is being rechristened as "Lithium Valley."

In a region desperate for jobs and income, the prospect of a "white gold rush" is appealing. Public officials have been working to roll out the red carpet for big investors, including trying to create a clear plan for infrastructure and a quicker permitting process. To get community groups' support, they are playing up the potential for jobs, including company commitments to hire local workers.

But Imperial Valley residents who have been on the butt end of get-rich schemes around water and real estate in the past are worried that their political leaders may be giving away the store. As we explore in our new book, Charging Forward: Lithium Valley, Electric Vehicles and a Just Future, the United States has an opportunity to ensure that these residents directly benefit from the lithium extraction boom, which is an important part of the global shift to clean energy.

Possibilities and perils in 'Lithium Valley'

Imperial Valley is emblematic of the potential and the risks that have long faced impoverished communities in resource-rich regions.

To understand the possibilities and perils in Imperial Valley, it's useful to remember that the world is not just moving away from fossil fuel extraction but toward more mineral extraction. Today's battery technology -- necessary for electric vehicles and energy storage -- relies on minerals including cobalt, magnesium, nickel and graphite. And mineral extraction is often accompanied by obscured environmental risks.

In Imperial Valley, environmental and community organizations are worried about lithium extraction's water use, waste and air pollution as production steps up and truck traffic increases. When your region's childhood asthma rate is already more than twice the national average, and dust from the drying lake is toxic, kicking up a "little extra dust" is a big deal.

Comite Civico del Valle, a long-established environmental justice organization in Imperial Valley, has sued to slow down a streamlined permitting process for Controlled Thermal Resources, a company planning lithium extraction there. The group's concern is that inadequate environmental reviews could result in harm to residents' health. Both the company and public officials are warning that the lawsuit could stop the lithium boom before it begins.

Local communities are also concerned about how much benefit they will see while the industry profits. They note that the electric vehicle boom driving lithium demand occurred precisely because of public policy. Tesla, for example, has benefited from multiple rounds of state and federal zero-emissions vehicle incentives, including the sale of emissions credits that accounted for 85% of Tesla's gross margin in 2009 and rose to $1.8 billion a year by 2023.

Behind these policies and financial incentives have been public will and taxpayer money.

We believe that local residents, not just companies, deserve a return. Rather than promising to just pay for community "benefits," such as environmental mitigation, contributions to municipal coffers or jobs, the companies could pay "dividends" directly to local residents and communities.

There are models of this dividend approach. For example, the Alaska Permanent Fund gives an annual amount to all residents of that state from revenues obtained from the oil beneath the ground.

In Imperial Valley, the actual ownership of the lithium is complex, involving a mix of privately owned subsurface rights, public lease rights obtained by companies and public rights held by the regional water district to whom companies will pay royalties.

Given the ownership complexities and the desire to benefit as development takes place, local authorities and community organizations persuaded the state in 2022 to pass a per-metric-ton lithium tax to address local needs.

That "flat tax" was bitterly resisted by some in the emerging industry on the grounds that it could make Imperial Valley's less-polluting extraction method too costly to compete with environmentally damaging imports; after the vote, CTR's CEO called the legislators "clowns." Meanwhile, CTR has also agreed to hire union workers in the construction phase. Everyone -- companies, communities and government officials -- is struggling to balance economic viability with accountability.

Lessons for a just transition

The hesitance of low-income Imperial Valley residents to immediately buy into the lithium vision is deeply rooted in history.

Decades of racial exclusion, patronizing practices and broken promises have led to deep distrust of outsiders who assert that things will be better this time.

Irrigation at the turn of the last century was supposed to bring an agriculture boom, but the early result was a broken canal that released enough water over nearly two years of disrepair to create what is now the Salton Sea. The Salton Sea was then supposed to fuel recreational tourism, but the failure to replenish it with anything but agricultural runoff helped to kill fish, birds and recreation. A more recent scheme to attract solar farms in recent decades delivered little employment and more worries about agricultural displacement.

Building the supply chain here, too

In recent years, some people have pinned their hopes on lithium. The main site so far in Imperial Valley has been CTR's Hell's Kitchen. It's a fitting moniker on summer days when temperatures regularly exceed 110 degrees.

Ensuring that the surrounding communities benefit from this new lithium boom will require thinking about how to attract not just companies extracting the lithium but also those that will use it. So far, Imperial County has had limited success in attracting related industries. In 2023, a company named Statevolt said it would build a "gigafactory" there to assemble batteries. However, the company's previous efforts -- Britishvolt in Britain and Italvot in Italy -- have stalled without any volts being produced. Imperial County will need serious suitors to make a go of it.

A potentially promising future for modern transportation and energy storage may be brewing in Imperial Valley. But getting to a brighter future for everyone will require remembering a lesson from the past: that community investments tend to be hard-won. We believe that ensuring everyone benefits long term is essential for achieving a more inclusive and sustainable future.

Manuel Pastor is a distinguished professor of sociology and American studies & ethnicity at USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences. Chris Benner is a professor and the director of the Institute for Social Transformation at Professor at University of California, Santa Cruz.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article. The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of the author.

VA weighs whether so-called forever chemicals have connection to kidney cancer



 If a scientific review indicates exposure to PFAS is connected to the onset of kidney cancer, veterans and their family members won't be required to prove military service caused the condition. Photo by ckstockphoto/Pixabay

Sept. 25 (UPI) -- The Department of Veterans Affairs will study a potential relationship between so-called "forever chemicals" and kidney cancer among veterans.

If the VA study links kidney cancer to exposure to polyfluoroalkyl substances, commonly referred to as PFAS, the VA would include them among conditions for which veterans and their qualifying family members automatically obtain benefits when diagnosed with kidney cancer.

PFAS chemicals also are called "forever chemicals" because it takes hundreds of years for them to break down.

The substances commonly are found in plastics, including food packaging, and can leach into packaged foods.

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They also are contained within firefighting foam commonly used to put out jet fuel fires at Air Force bases and on aircraft carriers.

"We want to understand the health conditions that veterans are living with so we can provide them with all of the benefits they deserve," VA Secretary Denis McDonough said. That's what this review process is all about."

If the scientific review indicates exposure to PFAS is connected to the onset of kidney cancer, veterans and their family members won't be required to prove military service caused the condition.

Federal law requires the VA to automatically provide benefits for veterans and their qualifying family members when diagnosed with health conditions commonly associated with exposure to certain toxic substances while in the military or when staying at military facilities.

Veterans and their family members who are diagnosed with kidney cancer can apply for VA benefits now.

If the VA declares kidney cancer to be a presumptive condition caused by exposure to PFAS, the burden of proof for those with kidney cancer will be much lower.

"Veterans should not wait for the outcome of this review to apply for the benefits and care they deserve," McDonough said. "If you're a veteran and believe your military service has negatively impacted your health, we encourage you to apply for VA care and benefits today."

PFAS are a class of more than 12,000 chemicals and have been used by the military since the early 1970s.

The VA will assess claims on an individual basis, but the claims-approval process will be much faster and easier if kidney cancer is made a presumptive condition due to PFAS exposure.

Study in veterans suggests area of brain injury key to PTSD

By Dennis Thompson, HealthDay News

Sept. 26, 2024 


Brain damage that veterans suffered from flying shrapnel has provided a major clue that could lead to better treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), a new study says. Photo by Adobe Stock/HealthDay News

Brain damage that veterans suffered from flying shrapnel has provided a major clue that could lead to better treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), a new study says.

Veterans who suffered shrapnel damage connected to their amygdala, the fear center of the brain, were less likely to develop PTSD, researchers reported Tuesday in the journal Nature Neuroscience.

The results suggest that PTSD could be treated by using electrical pulses to disrupt brain networks linked to the amygdala, they added.

"This is a very real brain disease, and we can localize it to certain brain circuits," said corresponding author Dr. Shan Siddiqi, a psychiatrist in the Brigham and Women's Hospital Center for Brain Circuit Therapeutics. "Unfortunately, people sometimes assume PTSD has to do with how mentally strong or weak a person is, but it has nothing to do with moral character."

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Researchers previously have uncovered brain networks to successfully treat depression and addiction using neurostimulation, and have been trying to locate the network associated with PTSD.

For this study, the research team examined 193 patients from the Vietnam Head Injury Study who'd suffered brain injuries from shrapnel penetrating their skulls.

"Some of these veterans who got shrapnel in their head went on to develop PTSD, but many of them did not," said study co-author Dr. Michael Fox, director of the Center for Brain Circuit Therapeutics. "The patients actually developed PTSD less than other veterans who did not get damage to their brain."

Researchers mapped where the shrapnel brain damage had occurred in the brains of these veterans, and compared the data to 180 veterans who didn't have brain damage.

The comparison found less PTSD in veterans who had shrapnel-caused lesions in the brain network tied to the amygdala.

The team also reviewed data from previous clinical trials involving neurostimulation, to see if the circuit they'd highlighted had already been targeted in some patients.

"The trials where stimulation was hitting the circuit we identified tended to be the trials that had good outcomes in patients," Fox said.

During the study, a patient in California with severe PTSD requested treatment with transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS), in which a brain implant uses a magnetic field to generate electrical pulses in specific parts of the brain.

Doctors used TMS to target the brain circuit identified by the study of veterans, and the man's PTSD improved, researchers report.

While it's only one patient, the case shows how this brain circuit could be used to treat PTSD, Fox said.

However, there will need to be clinical trials in a larger group of patients before this therapy can be approved by the U.S. Food and Dug Administration, researchers said.

"While more work remains to be done, we've taken an important step here to identify a therapeutic target for a condition in patients who desperately need better treatments," Fox said.

More information

The Cleveland Clinic has more on transcranial magnetic stimulation.

Copyright © 2024 HealthDay. All rights reserved.

Is Berlin in a 'club death' spiral?

Stuart Braun

DW

09/27/2024

Two iconic Berlin techno clubs recently announced they will close. Rising rents and falling profits are partly to blame, but is the city also losing its nightlife luster?

With the revered Watergate nightclub closing, is it the beginning of the end or can Berlin clubland survive?

Image: Travel-Stock-Image/IMAGO


Berlin's legendary club scene is struggling. Though some venues got a bump after long pandemic lockdowns, high inflation, rising rents and declining tourist numbers have seen queues dwindle across clubland in the capital.

Fabled dance venues in the city generated €1.5 billion in revenue in 2018, and Germany this year recognized Berlin techno clubs as UNESCO "intangible culture assets."

Yet clubsterben, or club death, is becoming a persistent theme as several iconic venues close their doors.

Watergate, a pioneering electronic dance music club by the Spree River that opened in 2002, will say goodbye to Berlin this New Year's Eve. The announcement sent shockwaves through the industry after another stalwart venue, Wilde Renate, also said it would close in 2025 after failing to negotiate a new lease.

The latter is among several clubs that were also threatened by the extension of the A100 highway through Berlin.

It seemed like the party would never end when Watergate, and the music label of the same name, esablished itself as a techno and house music mecca in the mid 2000s

Image: Enters/IMAGO

Long a hub for global DJs, Watergate can no longer afford top-tier talent. It is also struggling to attract the party hordes that once flocked to its "water" dance floor perched on the river.

"The days when Berlin was flooded with club-loving visitors are over, at least for now, and the scene is fighting for survival," said the owners in an Instagram post.

They partly blamed "financial pressure" driven by "high rents, war, inflation, rising costs" for deciding not to renew their lease.

But the Watergate founders, who developed the venue from the ground up in the wake of legendary early clubs like Tresor, also pointed to a deeper problem.

Are Berlin clubs losing relevance?

"[A] change in the nightlife dynamics of the next club generation and a shift in the relevance of club culture in general," was also behind Watergate's choice to say farewell.

One reason for this fundamental shift is that Berlin's smaller independent clubs can no longer compete with the big festivals that draw young people by the tens of thousands to watch megastar DJs.

Compounded by broader economic stress, clubs could decline in the same way as Berlin's traditional corner pubs, or Kneipen, Watergate co-founder Ulrich Wombacher told the Berliner Zeitung newspaper.

These local bars once numbered around 20,000 but now only some 500 are left, says the Berlin Hotel and Restaurant Association, with evictions and spiraling rents also being blamed.

Berlin: Capital of techno and club culture  04:19

'Notorious' property baron displacing clubs

Like the Kneipen, the labyrinthine Wilde Renate club, set in a former tenement on the opposite side of the Spree from Watergate, will also likely shut in late 2025 due to high rents and a failure to renew their lease.

The owners told club website Resident Advisor that their "notorious" landlord, property developer Gijora Padovicz — who since the 1990s has purchased swathes of apartment blocks in central Berlin — refused to cooperate despite "intensive efforts to find an extension to the contract or alternative solutions."

Padovicz also owns the Watergate building in the fast-gentrifying Kreuzberg district. After he doubled the rent in the late 2010s, Wombacher said the Watergate owners refused to raise prices to cover the increase. The venue has been in a financial crisis ever since.

Wilde Renate will shut after 18 years when its lease expires at the end of 2025

Image: dts-Agentur/picture alliance

Around 43% of Berlin club operators are affected by rising commercial rents, which further exacerbates the tense economic situation, according to Lutz Leichsenring, spokesperson for the Club Commission, which supports club culture in the capital.

Writing in the Tagesspiegel newspaper, Leichsenring emphasized the need to regulate commercial rents for culturally important locations such as clubs and to guarantee affordable rents in the long term.

This guarantee can be made if Berlin clubs are recognized as UNESCO World Heritage sites, and not just objects of "intangible cultural heritage" within Germany — something Berlin Culture Minister Joe Chialo also supports.

Club culture 'transforming' rather than declining

Another reason for the challenging times across Berlin's clubscape is the fact that young people of prime clubbing age spent their formative years shut out of clubs during the pandemic.

This youth "couldn't build a relationship with club culture," noted Marcel Weber, the chairman of the board of the Berlin Club Commission.

Coming of age in an era of economic stagnation and decline has further limited young people's ability to indulge in Berlin's kaleidoscopic nightlife.

Nonetheless, Weber believes that Berlin's clubs continue to "play a vital role in the city's economy and tourism."

Rave the Planet, for example, the latest incarnation of the storied Love Parade techno street party, is fast growing into a major global event.

Revellers attend the Rave The Planet techno parade near the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin in 2023

Image: Fabrizio Bensch/REUTERS

A transient club culture that emerged from the abandoned wastes of former East Berlin has always been in flux, Weber added.

"Berlin has always been a city of change, and the club scene is adapting to these changes," he said. "What we're observing is more of a transformation than a decline."
Retaining hope amid 'chaos'

Talk of clubsterben in Berlin is nothing new. In 2022, Berlin's world renowned techno club Berghain was threatening to shut its doors but has carried on — for now.

Other clubs like Griessmühle, a post-industrial dance complex set on a canal in the inner Neukölln district, was evicted in 2019 but later reopened as RSO in a former factory in distant but up-and-coming Schöneweide.

Investors vs. Berlin's club scene  03:26

New venues are also opening in clubs that have shut down, Weber noted, including Maaya Berlin, formerly known as Haubentaucher, a hub for African and Afro-diasporic music, art and culture.

Under the motto "Beyond Tomorrow: Remaining Hopeful in Chaos," Berlin's Club Commission is organizing the fifth edition of the Day of Club Culture on October 3-10, which included applications from 185 clubs and cultural collectives for up to €10,000 in funding.

With events happening across the city, the festival aims to "showcase Berlin's clubs and collectives as places of strength, hope and rethinking in challenging times."

Edited by: Tanya Ott

Stuart Brun Berlin-based journalist with a focus on climate and culture.

German AfD taps into young voters' fears, disillusionment

Hans Pfeifer

DW

09/25/2024

More and more young Germans support the right-wing Alternative for Germany (AfD) party. It capitalizes on their pessimistic outlook and disappointment with other parties, experts say.

When the Alternative for Germany (AfD) party was founded in 2013, it had the reputation of an old man's club: gray hair, suits, professors, businessmen from the baby boomer generation. It seemed to be composed mostly of men dissatisfied with the fiscal and foreign policies of then-Chancellor Angela Merkel.

Eleven years later, hardly any of that political landscape remains. Merkel is no longer chancellor, and the AfD has changed dramatically. It has become more radical, but it has also become much younger. And this became increasingly clear during the European Parliament election and a trio of state elections that took place in eastern Germany in 2024.

The anti-immigration party campaigned heavily for the votes of young people. For example, in the eastern state of Thuringia, AfD state chairman Björn Höcke organized a motorcycle rally at the end of the election campaign. His supporters rattled through towns and villages on smoky and smelly two-wheelers made by Simson, a motorcycle manufactured in the former East Germany that is now popular among young people. The rally was accompanied by a professionally coordinated campaign on TikTok, Instagram and other social media, and drew the attention of most of the country's traditional media as well.

Germany: Concerns over far-right lead in 2nd state election 01:54

AfD goes all in on social media

The anti-immigration populist party employs numerous PR experts from its right-wing "apron," as it calls the numerous far-right groups that have gathered around the party. This fuels the mood on social media with emotional and polarizing campaigns.

With provocative messages such as "Germany is going bankrupt," or proclamations that the government of Chancellor Olaf Scholz "hates you," they play on fears that many young people have. And then they immediately offer a solution: the AfD.

Clearly, the campaigns have been successful: in the state election in Brandenburg on Sunday, almost one in three young people voted for the AfD. In comparison: three years ago, around 50% of young people voted for the parties of the governing federal coalition of Social Democrats, Greens and Free Democrats (FDP).

"These three parties have failed in the eyes of young people," explained Klaus Hurrelmann in an interview with Deutschlandfunk radio. One of the most renowned researchers on youth in Germany, he regularly conducts scientific surveys with young people and analyzes their attitudes and views.

"They have not managed to get their own issues across: Climate, education, prosperity, peace," he said.

Pessimistic view of the future

According to Hurrelmann, it is critical to the AfD's success that the current federal government appears incapable of taking action.

"Young people are pragmatic, they want a government that tackles and solves the problems," he said. "And now there is a party that promises them blue skies and says: 'Vote for us!' And that is the AfD."

Experts believe that disappointment is compounded by fear of the future. This is shown by the latest major survey Hurrelmann presented earlier this year showing that many teenagers and young adults are pessimistic about the future. They are worried about social decline, war, or not being able to find a home. The result is noteworthy because the job prospects for young people in Germany have not been this good in years due to the baby boomers reaching retirement age.

The great urban-rural divide in eastern Germany

But why is the AfD particularly successful in eastern Germany? According to sociologist Steffen Mau from Humboldt University Berlin, it has to do with a pronounced urban-rural divide. In his book "Ungleich vereint" ("Unequally United"), he wrote: "In the east, there is a much bigger gap between young people in the city and their peers in the countryside." Outside the urban centers, the AfD dominates, according to Mau. "The urban-rural divide could, as it stands, be decisive for the division of society in eastern Germany."

According to many other experts, it is alarming that the AfD and its supporters are becoming increasingly openly racist and radical in their campaigns.

At the AfD's election party in Brandenburg, supporters of the party's youth wing sang loudly and exuberantly to a self-recorded pop song: "We'll deport them all!" the dancing group bellowed. In a video for the song, the creators use racist clichés of allegedly threatening dark-haired and dark-skinned foreigners who endanger Germany. At the same time, they present themselves as the blonde, radiant and sexy saviors of Germany who deport immigrants by the planeload.

How Germany's far-right AfD is reaching young voters  02:38

This kind of hateful content is evidently becoming increasingly popular with young people. "Right-wing extremist, nationalist, and authoritarian positions have increased," among young people, according to Klaus Hurrelmann.

Nevertheless, when you look at society as a whole, they still form a minority. This was underlined by a study conducted by the University of Leipzig in 2023, which found that only a very small proportion of people in eastern Germany have a consolidated right-wing extremist world view.

All experts agree that TikTok and similar platforms are having a formative influence on young people's political attitudes and voting behavior because social media is their most important source of information.

What can help? Philipp Sälhoff of the Berlin think tank Polisphere told DW: "Education. Media education and media literacy are a huge issue. It has to be in schools. It has to be in the curriculum."

'After Hitler': Changing German views of Nazism

Katarzyna Domagala-Pereira

09/26/2024

From secret adoration to loud dismay, Germans have come to terms with the Nazi past over 80 years in very different ways, as a new exhibition shows.

The German press helped to create shifting perspectives on Hitler in postwar GermanyImage: Federico Gambarini/dpa/picture alliance

In 1932, sculptor Hedwig Maria Ley, a Nazi sympathizer, created the first authorized depiction of soon-to-be German dictator Adolf Hitler.

The Nazi party made her bust the model for portraying the leader throughout his notorious rule. However after Hitler's death by suicide and Germany's defeat in World War II, Ley buried the bust in her garden.

Twenty years later, a relative of her gardener dug up the sculpture and placed it proudly on the fireplace in his living room — where it stayed until the 1980s.

Such continuing reverence for the infamous Nazi leader was in stark contrast to young people who wanted to disassociate from older generations who had often embraced German fascism.

This generational divide is the basis for a new exhibition, "After Hitler: Germany's Reckoning with the Nazi Past," now on show at the Haus der Geschichte (House of History) in the former German capital, Bonn.

The story of Hedwig Maria Ley's bust of Hitler is a feature of the exhibition tracing shifting attitudes to Nazism across near 80 years. It illustrates how some Germans still adored a tyrannical leader who fomented the horrors of the Holocaust.

While the following "68er" protest generation deplored their parents' Nazi sympathies, "After Hitler" shows how far-right political parties like the Alternative for Germany (AfD) are again on the rise in Germany.

The bust that helped create an enduring Hitler myth for a war-time generation

Image: Meike Böschemeyer/epd

Were Nazi 'fellow travellers' only acting under orders?

After the World War II, many Germans wanted to wipe away the memory of the former dictator, including through the renaming of streets that celebrated Hitler, his birthplace and so on.

As the adult generation who survived the war were busy rebuilding their lives in a destroyed postwar Germany, many did not talk about their own role in the Third Reich.

They were reluctant to fill out denazification questionnaires, and absolved themselves of responsibility by blaming Hitler and his commanders like Joseph Goebbels and Hermann Göring for war crimes.

The allied occupiers who charged Nazis for these crimes considered many Germans as "fellow travellers" who willingly worked for the Nazi regime — yet many still kept their jobs in the postwar republic — including in the new capital, Bonn.

Films revealing the Nazi concentration and extermination camps became compulsory screenings for West Germans, but it was different in the newly formed German Democratic Republic in the east.

There, the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED) propagated the anti-fascist founding myth that former Nazis only existed in the West. Anyone who embraced the socialist state was freed from guilt.

Perspectives on perpetrators

The "After Hitler" exhibition in Bonn explores the political and social context of the four generations of Germans who have tried to process the Nazi past in different ways.

Among the archival material on display is footage of a television reporter who in 1962 asks passers-by on the street about Jewish people. Some openly tell the reporter that Jews should not be allowed to work in the federal government, or that "there are too many of them," or even that "they were rightly persecuted."

These racist statements emerged from a generation of perpetrators of Nazi power and crimes.

Soon after, in 1965, several graves in the Jewish cemetery of the Bavarian city of Bamberg were desecrated. Five years later, an arson attack was carried out on a retirement home belonging to the Jewish community in Munich, killing seven Holocaust survivor residents. These were among hundreds of anti-Semitic attacks at the time.

At the same time, one exhibition section describes the generation of children who shaped social life from the 1960s and critically questioned their parents about their role in the Third Reich.

The search for the truth about the Nazi era was also becoming a part of popular culture. In 1979, twenty million Germans aged fourteen and over watched the award-winning US miniseries "Holocaust." Tens of thousands called the studio after the film was broadcast, most saying the film had opened their eyes.

Many were part of the next generation — the grandchildren of the National Socialist generation — who grew up in the 1980s and 1990s, in a time of crisis but also reunification and the rise of the environmental movement.

A still from the miniseries 'Holocaust,' which starred Meryl Streep and had a big impact on a new generation in Germany

Image: K. Domagala-Pereira/DW

Telling the story of the victims

The "After Hitler" exhibition also devotes significant space to the postwar echoes of those who suffered under Nazism.

Among the display of some 500 objects is an unremarkable, small brown public transport ticket. It belonged to Erna Meintrup, who survived the Theresienstadt ghetto — which served as a collection and transit camp in the Nazi concentration camp system — before returning to her hometown of Münster.

But like many persecuted people, Meintrup did not talk about her imprisonment.

Also featured at the Haus der Geschichte is a bicycle belonging to a Jewish boy who gave it to a friend for safekeeping. It was not until 2007 that this friend, now an elderly man, gave the bicycle to an antiquarian bookshop. He had waited in vain for decades for his friend to return.

Next to the bike is a suitcase full of documents and memorabilia. This is all that remains of a Jewish family sent to the Regensburg concentration camp in Bavaria. An employee of the family kept the suitcase, and in it placed the letters that the family had written from the camp before they were murdered.

The exhibition organisers approach the topic less from a political perspective and more "through objects that tell many personal stories," said Hanno Sowade, curator of "After Hilter."

The suitcase containing correspondence from a Jewish family in a death campImage: K. Domagala-Pereira/DW

Far-right ideology lives on

Members of the fourth generation who have had to come to terms with the Nazi era were born after reunification in 1990. Many come from immigrant families and have no family ties to National Socialism.

Yet young people increasingly "understand the history of National Socialism as a warning for the present," say the exhibition organizers. "They demonstrate against right-wing populism and commemorate the victims of right-wing extremist violence."

Nonetheless, many young people have opportunities to engage with far right, neo-Nazi ideology, especially through social media.

In the summer of 2023, a right-wing extremist set fire to a converted telephone box that contained literature on National Socialism, as well as an audio station with excerpts from Holocaust victim Anne Frank's diary, and Hebrew songs.

The box was located near the "Gleis 17" memorial in the western Berlin district of Grunewald, a train platform from where throusands of Jewish people were deported to the extermination camps.

A Jewish boy never returned to reclaim his bicyle from a friend

Image: K. Domagala-Pereira/DW

Almost 80 years after the end of the Second World War, the exhibition makes it clear that German confrontation of the Nazi past remains vital amid the rapid rise of right-wing extremist parties like the AfD.

Hitler may be gone, but his fascist legacy lives on.

"After Hitler: Germany's Reckoning with the Nazi Past" runs until January 26, 2025 at Haus der Geschichte in Bonn.

This article was originally published in Polish. Editing: Silke Wünsch

Palestinian refugees: Forever displaced?

Astrid Prange de Oliveira | Jennifer Holleis

DW

28/09/24

The plight of Palestinian refugees has worsened dramatically since the Israel-Hamas war began. 

DW explains their status.

Fleeing from bombs: Displaced Palestinians take shelter in a tent in the southern Gaza Strip

Image: MOHAMMED ABED/AFP

Since the October 7, 2023 Hamas attack on Israel, the hope for peace and the return of Palestinian refugees to their old homes has all but disappeared. DW explains why there are more Palestinian refugees today than in 1948, and how their legal status differs from that of other refugees.

How many Palestinian refugees are there?

The Palestinian population in the Middle East is estimated at seven million people whose legal status varies. The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) reports that it currently supports 5.9 million people in the region.

They live in 58 refugee camps across Jordan, Syria, Gaza, and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem and Lebanon (see map).

Palestinian refugees also live in Egypt, where an estimated 100,000 have fled since the the Israel-Hamas war broke out. There are also 1.5 million Palestinian Israelis who live in Israel.

Who is considered a refugee?

According to UNRWA, these refugees are defined as "persons whose normal place of residence was Palestine during the period June 1, 1946 to May 15, 1948, and who lost both home and means of livelihood as a result of the 1948 conflict."

This also applies to "descendants of Palestine refugee males, including adopted children." As a result, the number of registered persons has risen from 750,000 in 1950 to almost six million today.

West Bank faces uncertain future as violence increases  02:25

What are the living conditions for Palestinian refugees?

The everyday experience of many Palestinian refugees and their families is characterized by poverty and discrimination. In many Arab host countries, Palestinians cannot acquire citizenship and are therefore stateless.

Around 80% of Palestinian refugees in Lebanon live below the national poverty line, according to UNRWA figures. They cannot buy property, are not allowed to work in all professions and have no access to the state education and healthcare systems.

In Jordan, around 2.3 million people are registered as Palestinian refugees. It is the only Arab country that has granted citizenship to this group—more than half of the Jordanian population is already of Palestinian origin.

The situation in Syria has steadily deteriorated due to the ongoing civil war. In 2021, a UNRWA survey revealed that 82% of registered Palestinian refugees were living in absolute poverty. Nevertheless, many are now returning to Syria due to the conflict between Israel and the Lebanese Hezbollah militia.

Why is there a refugee agency specifically for Palestinians?

UNRWA was established by UN Resolution 302 (IV) of December 8, 1949 and began its work on May 1, 1950. The UN General Assembly extended UNRWA's mandate in December 2022 to last until June 30, 2026.

The agency's task is to care for Palestinians who were displaced or forced to flee their homes as a result of the Arab-Israeli War and the founding of the State of Israel on May 14, 1948, along with their descendants. Palestinians refer to this period as the "Nakba”—a catastrophe.

A refugee camp in the Jordan Valley for Palestinians who were driven from their homes by Israeli forces in 1948. The Palestinians refer to this period as the “Nakba” — the catastropheImage: CPA Media/picture alliance

The UN Refugee Agency UNHCR is responsible for the protection of all other refugees and stateless persons worldwide. Like UNRWA, it was also founded in 1950.

The separation of responsibilities between the two agencies means that in countries such as Egypt, where Palestinian refugees are present but UNRWA is not, those affected live in a legal vacuum. This is because the UNHCR has no mandate to care for Palestinian refugees.

Fleeing War in Gaza — for a new life in Egypt?  28:29

Why has Israel demanded the dissolution of UNRWA?

The Israeli government accuses UNRWA of being involved in the October 7 massacre, claiming that the aid organization is infiltrated by Hamas.

Following these allegations, several donor countries — including the United States, the European Union and Germany — suspended their payments to UNRWA.

The UN launched an internal investigation into the allegations. In a statement published on August 5, 2024, it said that nine UNRWA employees had been dismissed due to possible involvement in the Hamas-led attacks against Israel on October 7, 2023. Allegations against ten other employees could not be substantiated.

Symbolic meaning: A Palestinian refugee shows the keys to the house from which his ancestors were expelledImage: Issam Rimawi/ZUMAPRESS/picture alliance

Is there a right of return?

According to Article 11 of UN Resolution 194, all refugees have the right to return to their homes if they are willing to live in peace with their neighbors. In the eyes of the governments of many Arab states, this also applies to today's descendants of those displaced in 1948.

"The Nakba catastrophe is a defining source of identity for the Palestinian population. It underscores injustice," says Peter Lintl, a member of the Africa and Middle East department at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs. In his view, the right of return "can only be resolved within the framework of peace negotiations and is only conceivable in a Palestinian state."

This article was originally published in German.

Astrid Prange de Oliveira DW editor with expertise in Brazil, globalization and religion

Jennifer Holleis Editor and political analyst specializing in the Middle East and North Africa.

Germany slows arms exports to Israel — without admitting it

Ben Knight

DW

September 27, 2024

Berlin appears to have stopped approving war weapons exports to Israel, even while insisting that there is no ban in place. Observers believe the government has been spooked by legal threats.

The Merkava tank (pictured here close to the Gaza Strip in southern Israel in October 2023) uses German-made engines

Image: Aris Messinis/AFP/Getty Images


The German government appears to have quietly stopped, or at least paused, arms exports to Israel since the start of 2024, while officially denying any change of policy.

Government figures revealed in an official answer to a parliamentary question from September 10 showed that while approvals of arms exports to Israel rose immediately after the Hamas attack of October 7, 2023, they then dropped at the turn of the year.

The parliamentary answers, issued by the German Economy Ministry, which is responsible for approving arms export licenses, stated that there have been no exports of "weapons of war" from January to June 2024. Meanwhile, export licenses for weapons components or technology — which fall under a different category — have continued this year, though at a significantly reduced scale.

To take one example from the parliamentary answer, the Economy Ministry said that just over €3 million ($3.35 million) worth of military parts and technology were approved in October 2023, while in July 2024, only around €35,000 worth of military equipment was sent.

Despite this, the Economy Ministry is adamant that these numbers do not indicate that the government has changed its stance. "There is no ban on the export of arms to Israel, nor will there be," a ministry spokesperson told DW in a statement.

All arms export applications, the spokesperson added, are assessed on their individual merits: "In doing so, the Federal Government takes into account compliance with international humanitarian law. This case-by-case approach always takes into account the current situation, including the attacks on Israel by Hamas and Hezbollah as well as the course of the operation in Gaza."

Berlin rejects claim Germany aids Gaza 'genocide'  04:18

Multiple court cases

Nevertheless, the numbers appear to represent a significant change in German military support for Israel: Germany has been Israel's second biggest supplier of arms for at least two decades. Statistics gathered by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), and presented in a report published by the investigative group Forensic Architecture (FA) in April, show that in 2023, Germany was responsible for 47% of Israel's total imports of conventional arms, following the US at 53%. FA also calculated that, of the €3.3 billion worth of the export licenses granted by Germany between 2003 and 2023, 53% were for war weapons. The rest was for other military equipment. Germany approved €326.5 million worth of arms exports to Israel in 2023 alone.

The German government has had to defend its military support for Israel in both domestic and international courts several times over the past year — often downplaying its arms exports as it does so.

In April, when Nicaragua brought an urgent case against Germany at the International Court of Justice under the UN's Genocide Convention, Germany's representatives told the ICJ that "98% of licenses granted after October 7 do not concern war weapons, but other military equipment." This could include engines for tanks, rather than whole tanks; the Merkava tank series used by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), for instance, has for decades used German-made engines and transmissions.

In fact, the government said in its plea to the ICJ, it had granted only four export licenses for "war weapons" in the past year: Three orders of ammunition (including one for 500,000 rounds) as well as propellant charges that it claimed were only suited for training purposes. The fourth order, the government admitted, was for "3,000 portable anti-tank weapons" — a license that had been granted "in the immediate context of Hamas massacres." These anti-tank weapons, known as Matadors, are essentially hand-held rocket-launchers, and several videos have surfaced in recent months showing Israeli soldiers firing these weapons at buildings in Gaza.
Chancellor Olaf Scholz (right) has consistently expressed his support for the Israeli government under Prime Minister Benjamin NetanyahuImage: Michael Sohn/AP/picture alliance

Not that the other 98% of exports — mainly components and training ammunition — is necessarily any less deadly: "To deliver 500,000 rounds of ammunition – supposedly only 'for training purposes' – seems to me to be a very suspicious statement," said Jürgen Grässlin, spokesperson for the German anti-arms trade campaign group Aktion Aufschrei – Stoppt den Waffenhandel. "The number is extremely high and raises doubts as to whether this ammunition is only to be used for training over however many years."

The government downplayed its arms exports to Israel in domestic court cases too. Earlier this year, five unnamed Palestinians living in Gaza brought a lawsuit to a Berlin court intended to force Germany to stop arms exports to Israel. The case, which was supported by the Berlin-based European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights (ECCHR) and three Palestinian human rights organizations, was dismissed by the court in June — partly for legal jurisdictional reasons, but also on the grounds that it was simply too late: Germany, the government had said, was no longer sending weapons to Israel anyway.

Sönke Hilbrans, senior legal advisor at ECCHR, was less than satisfied with the court's reasoning: "The courts have not checked this information," he said. "Instead, those affected are asked to prove the opposite, which no one outside the federal government could do." Indeed, there is presently no public knowledge of whether Germany is approving new weapons export licenses or not.

German-made Matador anti-tank weapons (carried here by a British soldier) are believed to have been used by the IDF in Gaza

Image: Andrew Chittock/StockTrek Images/IMAGO

Mixed messages

The result is that the government's actions and statements appear contradictory. As Max Mutschler, senior researcher at the Bonn International Centre for Conflict Studies (BICC), put it: "The information from the German government is extremely opaque when it comes to arms exports. Now anyone can interpret things how he or she likes — those who say the government has imposed a stop can point to the war weapons figures, while those who say deliveries are ongoing can point to the other deliveries and the government statements. It's really bad information policy."

Many observers believe the government may indeed have become more careful about approving new licenses, both because of the many reports of alleged war crimes being carried out by the IDF and the court cases. Sources with knowledge of the latter told DW on condition of anonymity that indeed concerns about the situation in Gaza and the possible legal threats for Germany had given the government pause.

"But there is another interpretation," said Mutschler. "A lot of weapons exports were approved in 2023, after October 7 and well into December. It could well be that everything that was on the table then, and which Israel ordered quickly following October 7, was rubberstamped very quickly, so that in the first half of 2024 there weren't that many export licenses left to approve." Mutschler believes it was probably a combination of both these factors — the old licenses were approved quickly towards the end of 2023, and then Germany became more reluctant to approve new ones for fear of legal issues.

Berlin 'violating' arms trade obligation: German lawyer  11:00

Either way, the German government's fundamental support for Israel doesn't appear to have changed. Andreas Krieg, a German associate professor of defense studies at King's College London, believes that the German government remains probably the most pro-Israeli state in the world, and that "they are still very much trying to do this, they're still standing with Israel, they still want to export." But at the same time, he suspects that the government is sitting on license approvals while it waits for legal advice: "I think it's not a political decision, I think it's a purely legal decision at this point," he told DW.

But the bigger concern, according to Krieg, is the lack of political or widespread public pressure on the German government to be more transparent about its military support for Israel. "The media landscape in Germany, and the public discourse, is almost exclusively on the side of Israel, and there are very few if any voices condemning what Israel is doing in Gaza," he said. "So I think the German government has a lot more leeway than, say, the British government here. In this context, the Germans don't have to be very transparent in what they're doing."

ECOCIDE

Brazil: Illegal salvage from Nazi ships poses oil threat

Alice de Souza | Astrid Prange de Oliveira

DW

There are more than 500 WWII wrecks off the coast of Brazil, some containing valuable metals. Researchers warn that the hunt for these resources could cause massive oil spills.

The Esso Hamburg was scuttled in 1941 while carrying a large cargo of oilImage: www.aukevisser.nl via Sixtant-Website

Brazilian marine biologists have solved a mystery that has long perplexed researchers across the world: Where do the heavy chunks of rubber that have often been washed up on beaches in northeastern Brazil over the past several years come from?

According to research by the Institute of Marine Sciences (Labomar) at the Federal University of Ceara (UFC) and the Autonomous University of Barcelona, the rubber bales, weighing up to 200 kg (441 lb), come from the German cargo ship MS Weserland, among others. It sank on January 3, 1944, and lies at a depth of more than 5,000 meters (16,404 feet) in the South Atlantic.

Clumps of rubber like this have long been washing up on Brazilian beaches

Image: Labomar UFC

Resource for the war

During the First and Second World Wars, rubber was an important material for the manufacture of cars, planes and uniforms. During the Second World War, Germans traveled to Southeast Asia, including Singapore, Malaysia and what was then Indochina — now Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia — to procure bales of latex.

They also loaded cargoes of metals such as cobalt, zinc and the mixed mineral wolframite. Brazilian marine researchers have calculated that the cargo carried by the MS Weserland could be worth $17-68 million (€15-61 million), taking the zinc price of May 2021 as a basis.

"This ship had loaded wolframite, a substance that experienced a boom on the stock markets during the pandemic especially, because it is used to manufacture mobile telephones, tablets and computers," says Luis Ernesto Arruda Bezerra from the Institute of Marine Sciences at the UFC.

The wreck of the MS Weserland is believed to be the source of the rubber balesImage: Sixtant-Website

'Ticking timebombs'

A study that is soon to be published by the scientific journal Ocean and Coastal Research (OCR) and that DW has already seen proves that the loss of the rubber bales from the wreck has coincided with the rising price for the metal cargo. The journal is published by the Oceanographic Institute at the University of Sao Paulo.

According to the foreword of the study, this supports the hypothesis that unauthorized deep-sea salvage operations are taking place in international waters.

It is estimated that there are 3 million sunken and abandoned ships cross the world's oceans. Among them are 8,500 "potentially polluting wrecks," according to statistics from the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).

Mass Allied submarine sinkings

Researchers at the Federal Universities of Alagoas (Ufal) and Ceara (UFC) have used mathematical simulations and the analysis of currents between Brazil and Africa to determine that the rubber was in two former German Nazi ships that were sunk during the Second World War in the South Atlantic.

The website Sixtant records information about ships that have been sunk in the South Atlantic. The UFC researchers used this information while looking for the provenance on the rubber bales. The website shows 25 German submarines and an Italian submarine that were sunk during the Second World War in a joint action by the US, Brazilian and British navies.

The website has listed altogether 548 ships that were sunk in the South Atlantic between 1939 and 1945. Fifty-six of them were German.

Sixtant has records of hundreds of shipwrecksImage: Sixtant-Website

There were also ships that transported more than 7,000 tons of heating oil and 1,200 tons of diesel oil, like the Esso Hamburg, which was scuttled in June 1941. According to the Sixtant website, at least four ships were transporting heating oil, and five rubber.

The first rubber bales, which were washed up in 2018 and 2019 in Brazil, came from the MS Rio Grande. This German ship was sunk by the US in 1944 as it tried to break through the sea blockade imposed by the US.
Lack of monitoring in international waters

The UFC researchers believe that the clumps of rubber are released from the ships for two reasons: because of the natural deterioration of the shipwrecks, and because pirates and illegal operations are hunting for raw materials.

They say that the monitoring of shipwrecks in international waters off the Brazilian coast is not enough to indentify potential polluters. This monitoring has been carried out up to now by the US.

The UFC intends to try to map the shipwrecks in an effort to classify the risks they pose to the Brazilian coast.

"But that is not a simple endeavor, as most of these ships are lying at a depth of more than 4,000 meters," says Marcelo Soares from the UFC's Institute of Marine Sciences.

The 2019 oil spill off Brazil is still not fully explainedImage: ANTONELLO VENERI/AFP via Getty Images

Environmental disaster as a 'side-effect'

"An operation dismantles a ship to extract the metal, and rubber and oil can be released as a side-effect, which reach the coast because they are driven by the currents. So the question is not whether the oil will spill, but when it will spill," says Arrruda Bezerra.

Between 2020 and July 2024, the Brazilian navy reported a monthly average of 14 oil leakages of various origins off the Brazilian coast, which amounts to 758 such incidents in all. This year so far, 87 cases involving 153,700 liters (40, 603 gallons) of spilled oil have been reported.

Arruda Bezerra fears that the leakage of oil from the wrecks could cause an environmental tragedy like the one in 2019. In that year, Brazil saw the biggest oil spill ever recorded in tropical waters, with around 5,000 tons of oil washed onto shore in altogether 11 states.

The cause remains uncertain.

This article was translated from German.

How Europe's far right is changing EU asylum policy

Ella Joyner in Brussels

DW

The EU has been hardening its migration policy for years, but the ascendant fortunes of the far right have member states skittish about their freshly agreed asylum reform package.

Far-right parties and governments are trying to exert influence on the EU's asylum policyImage: Nicolas Economou/NurPhoto/picture alliance

Less than six months ago, the European Union signed off a reform package designed to address glaring flaws in its common asylum system laid bare during the crisis years of 2015 and 2016, when the arrival of more than 1 million people overwhelmed ill-prepared national authorities.

The EU migration and asylum pact was the culmination of almost 10 years of fraught negotiations. It saw the 27 countries agree on measures to more evenly distribute the costs of taking in asylum seekers across the bloc, but also beef up external border protection to stop people reaching the EU in the first place.

Now, as far-right politicians exert ever more influence on the levers of powers in European capitals, both directly in government posts and indirectly in opposition, the deal looks more fragile than ever.

Netherlands plans ‘toughest migration policy ever'

In recent weeks, a string of countries that had previously been instrumental in getting the reform package, due to come into force in 2026, over the line have announced a hardening of their individual national asylum policies.

France's new right-wing government, tacitly dependent on the backing of the far-right National Rally, announced plans to tighten borders. Under pressure from recent electoral successes by the far-right Alternative for Germany party, the center-left coalition government in Berlin announced it would ramp up checks on EU internal borders to control migration.

From The Hague to Budapest, more and more EU capitals are governed wholly or in part by far right politiciansImage: Vivien Cher Benko/Handout Prime Minister Office Hungary/EPA

Last week, the Dutch minister in charge of asylum, Marjolein Faber of the far-right PVV, announced plans for the "toughest migration policy ever". But most controversially for the Netherlands' EU neighbors, Faber told the European Commission said she would seek an opt-out from the legally binding package.

Within days, Budapest announced similar ambitions, prompting short-lived fears of a domino effect.

EU rhetoric vs. reality

In the end, it quickly emerged that The Hague's demand would only come into play if and when the EU treaties were next renegotiated, something that is not on the cards any time soon.

Exemptions from EU law on certain policies are possible to obtain in theory (Denmark has one for migration policy), but getting one requires the agreement of the other states to be written into the EU's basic laws.

Critics of the EU migration pact say it undermines the right to seek asylumImage: Johanna Geron/REUTERS

As Alberto-Horst Neidhardt of the European Policy Center think tank explained, one should be careful to distinguish between rhetoric and the reality.

"We hear more and more political statements trying to send a message to the national electorate," Neidhardt said. "I would separate between the political declarations by governments in the past weeks, and the technical work on the pact, which is in full swing."

Camille Le Coz, an expert from the Migration Policy Institute think tank in Paris, agrees. "There's a gap between what you say and do." At the same time, "what you're saying publicly can have ramifications for the other countries." Greece, for example, was incensed by Germany's recent announcements about increased border checks, she pointed out.

Around the continent, governments are increasingly keen to be seen as being "tough" on migration. Many politicians fear being accused by the public of accepting EU laws that mean taking in more asylum seekers. The member states are closely watching each other, and accusations of free-riding or hypocrisy are quick to fly.

Slim chances for refugee relocations

In the next two years, each country will need to write the changes into national law. Under the new rules, asylum seekers and refugees are to be more thoroughly screened within seven days of arrival in the EU. They also allow certain applicants to be held at external borders and assessed in a fast-track procedure to allow for swifter deportation if unsuccessful.

But for far-right politicians like Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, the most contentious part of the law is a mechanism that obliges all EU states to take in approved refugees from other member states to spread new arrivals more evenly. Under EU rules, asylum applications are generally supposed to be made in the country of arrival, a system few would assert is fair to southern border states like Italy and Greece.

Dutch asylum center Ter Apel is synomonous with the EU's dysfunctional asylum systemImage: Ramon van Flymen/ANP/picture alliance

If other member states refuse relocations, with thousands set to take place each year, they must pay a financial contribution of €600 million ($668 million) a year or offer logistical support instead.

The Netherlands, for example, is likely to opt for financial or logistical contributions rather than accepting relocations, migration expert Neidhardt said. This wouldn't be the same as an actual opt-out, which would take years to negotiate. "The Netherlands remains bound to the rules just agreed."

How close is EU asylum policy to collapsing, really?

The migration and asylum pact was a compromise that satisfied no one totally — be they anti-immigration hardliners like the Hungarian government, states on EU external borders like Greece or common end destination countries like Germany.

Perhaps least impressed were those advocating for the rights of asylum seekers and migrants, who pointed out the deal would not stop thousands of people dying while crossing the Mediterranean every year and would likely undermine the right to claim asylum.

In Neidhardt's opinion, despite what EU governments say in public, privately they know that the deal is "too big too fail."

"Should the pact fail, that would mean the end of the common European asylum system," he said. "And that's not in the interest of any of the member states, whether we're talking about Germany, the Netherlands — whatever."

What do Germany's new border checks mean for Europe?  02:04

In fact, the toughening of EU asylum policy predates the pact, or even recent gains in influence for the far right in capitals from Stockholm to Rome. For years, the EU has been spending more on border protection and channeling funds to common countries of origin to try and stop people seeking a new life in the EU in the first place.
The EU's long road to reform

For Camille Le Coz of the Migration Policy Institute, the pact thrashed out earlier years remains the best way for member states deal with many migration management issues. The European Commission's priority must now be ensuring member states have the necessary "political buy-in" to keep things advancing, she warned.

"The whole reason why we have this common European asylum system is connected with the Schengen area and freedom of movement," she recalled.

For Le Coz, it remains to be seen if this very "fragile" deal can hold. The first milestones are already looming. By the end of the year, all the member states are supposed to have finalized their implementation plans. "I think that's going to be very interesting to see."

Edited by: Andreas Illmer