Starting Monday, 16 September 2024, checks at all of Germany’s land borders will be temporarily reintroduced. This includes Germany’s western and northern borders. Border checks are already in place at Germany’s borders with Poland, Austria, Switzerland and the Czech Republic. These will continue unchanged.

The Federal Police will conduct border checks flexibly and as required by the security situation. The extent, length and specific locations of border checks will depend on the security situation. This means that border checks will not be carried out everywhere along all borders but rather in a targeted way to combat cross-border crime and further limit irregular migration.

The Federal Police will make every effort to keep the impact on travellers and commuters as minimal as possible. To do so, the Federal Police are working closely with their partner authorities in Germany’s neighbouring countries and in the federal states. However, temporary negative impacts on cross-border traffic cannot be completely avoided.

Travellers and commuters are asked to have official identification (national ID card or passport) with them. This is a requirement for all cross-border travel, regardless of any checks. Nationals of non-EU countries must meet the requirements for entering Germany, including a visa, if necessary.

Federal Minister of the Interior Nancy Faeser said: “Starting Monday, the Federal Police will carry out border checks at all of Germany’s borders. We want to reduce irregular migration further, stop migrant smugglers and criminals, and detect Islamists before they can do any harm. We continue to work closely with our neighbouring countries. We want to make sure that border control measures affect cross-border commuters and people living in the border regions as well as businesses and commerce as little as possible. The checks at Germany’s borders with Poland, the Czech Republic, Austria and Switzerland have been going well for some time now and show how that can be done. These checks also ensure that we can effectively deny entry at the borders, and more than 30,000 people have been refused entry since October 2023. Since then, the number of asylum applications has fallen by 20% and the number of removals has gone up by 20% too. This shows that our measures are working. And that is why we are continuing to pursue this course. 

“I am extremely grateful to the officers of the Federal Police for their strong commitment to policing the border. These efforts are only possible because we have increased funding and added a thousand officers each year, and we will continue to do so.” 

The Federal Police are working closely and on the basis of trust with their partner authorities in Germany’s neighbouring countries. Cross-border police cooperation includes joint patrols as well as police and customs cooperation centres, among other things. 

The grounds for ordering temporary border control are the need to limit irregular migration further and to protect Germany’s internal security. With regard to irregular migration, Germany’s overall burden must be taken into account, especially the limited capacity of municipalities to provide housing, education and integration services after taking in 1.2 million refugees from the war in Ukraine and large numbers of asylum seekers in recent years.

The current security environment is also crucial, particularly the need to protect against Islamist extremist terrorism and serious cross-border crime.

Checks at Germany’s land border with Austria are currently in place until 11 November 2024, while the order to conduct checks at the land borders with Switzerland, the Republic of Poland and the Czech Republic remains in force until 15 December 2024. These temporary border control measures will be continued and their scheduling adjusted accordingly. Since the temporary border checks were reintroduced at Germany’s borders with Poland, the Czech Republic, Austria and Switzerland on 16 October 2023, the Federal Police have detected approximately 52,000 illegal entries and refused entry to some 30,000 people at Germany’s borders. Entry is currently denied to people who do not have valid entry documents, who present forged or falsified documents, or who attempt to enter without a visa or valid residence title.