Germany Reviews Afghan Refugees

Political refugees who fled Afghanistan before the fall of the Taliban regime more than three years ago can no longer count on asylum in Germany, according to a court ruling on Thursday. The administrative court in Kassel, central Germany, decided that members of the Northern Alliance no longer have anything to fear in Afghanistan. The Northern Alliance forces helped the United States and its other allies to oust the Taliban in late 2001. But the court ruled that members of the Communist party, which supported the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan in the 1980s, would still be in danger if they return home. More than 70,000 Afghan refugees are living in Germany, although 8,000 of them do not have the status of refugees but are allowed to stay for the time being. A legal freeze on sending the refugees back home, agreed by interior ministers from Germany's 16 states, runs out at the end of April.