'We Don't Want Germany to be Islamic Country in Future' - AfD MP

Sputnik discussed the initiative with Joachim Paul, German MP and deputy leader of the AfD party in Rhineland-Palatinate.

Sputnik: What are your thoughts on the timing of this report? Does it come as a surprise to you?

Joachim Paul: I guess we're in the midst of an immigration crisis in Germany, we have mobbing in schools against German and Jewish pupils, and I consider this as an act of despair because the coalition is in despair, and we have elections in Bavaria, and I guess it is a political move. We should try to bring people out of Germany that have no right to be here, especially, those from Northern Africa, from Muslim countries in Arabia, speaking of Syria, and we shouldn't have any immigration from Muslim countries, this would be a good idea.

Sputnik: So your party, you are against Muslim countries, is this similar to what Donald Trump has suggested with his Muslim ban?

Joachim Paul: Well actually I have to see that, for example, people are coming especially from Northern Africa where there's a big Muslim population, and they are asylum-seekers but they have no right to be here, they're just coming because the economy is not very good in their countries but this is not the right to have asylum here, and we should control our borders and our perspective must be that we don't have any further immigration from Muslim countries, because we now have very big problems in Germany, integration problems, and to be honest, it has to do with Muslim immigration, not with immigration from Buddhist countries or from Northern European countries.

Sputnik: There's also a Christian population in some African countries and even in the Middle East, do you feel that religion should be a basis for determining whether or not people are allowed to gain asylum?

Joachim Paul: The overwhelming majority of our asylum-seekers are coming from Muslim countries especially from Afghanistan, Pakistan, from Algeria, from Morocco, from Tunisia; you should keep in mind that even the bodyguard of Osama bin Laden, who is a Tunisian, he has been living for one year in Germany getting social welfare. This is a scandal, this is a typical example that our immigration is overwhelmingly by Muslims, and we have integration problems which have to do with their Muslim cultural approach, which is a problem for Germany.

READ MORE: 4th Gen Muslims in Germany Don't Feel at Home, Prone to Radicalization — Prof.

Sputnik: So the wording of what you're proposing to do is that we don't accept people of this country because they're Muslim or would you say we don't accept people who are of the Muslim faith?

Joachim Paul: Well actually will have to discuss in the future how immigration should be organized, and we should discuss if it is better to let immigration happen from countries which are culturally quite similar to Germany and who don't have a strong Islamist theme in their countries, this is a discussion we have to lead in Germany, so I see it on a perspective.

Sputnik: Doesn't this seem like a dangerous thing for Germany to start discriminating based on religion?

Joachim Paul: Well we're not discriminating on the basis of religion, for example, we have immigration to the US and high educated people coming from Muslim countries, but we have exactly the opposite immigration from countries which have massive economic problems and political Islam is very strong in these countries, so I have to face this problem we can't say that this is just immigration, we can't label this as discriminating because for our life in Germany we have to control our faith, and we don't want Germany to be an Islamic country in the future.

Sputnik: Perhaps there should be more of a focus on whether or not a person is able to provide for themselves and for their family and contribute to German society, that is something that would be more socio-economically based…

Joachim Paul: In Germany we have massive integration problems and these integration problems have to do with Muslim immigration: we have terror, we have mobbing of Jewish and German children in schools, they have a mindset attached to Sharia and there's a lot of things indicating this, and this has nothing to do with Buddhists, this has nothing to do with Canadians; we have a certain problem with Islam and it's is our right to very critically discuss this issue.

The views and opinions expressed by the speaker do not necessarily reflect those of Sputnik.