Ideology instead of facts: How Germany downplays crime committed by foreign nationals

 

Statistics suggest that foreign nationals commit significantly more crimes than Germans. However, the state and state-affiliated organizations keep glossing over the problem. Their explanations hardly stand up to scrutiny.

Jonas Hermann, Berlin April 10, 2025

The idea that foreign nationals commit more crimes than Germans was long considered an unforgivable prejudice. Anyone who pointed this out faced harsh criticism and accusations of racism or xenophobia. In the meantime, however, people without a German passport are so clearly overrepresented in criminal offense statistics in Germany that the issue can no longer be denied. Although they only make up around 17% of the population, foreign nationals were registered as suspects in almost 42% of crimes reported in Germany. This is according to the police crime statistics for the year 2024, which the Ministry of the Interior published on April 2.

However, some media outlets, state-funded organizations and even the BKA, or Federal Criminal Police Office, are still making curious statements about crimes committed by foreign nationals. They can no longer ignore the phenomenon, but they seem to have a tendency to relativize it.
Take the BKA, for instance, offers a rather trivial explanation for why foreign nationals are overrepresented in crime statistics – namely that increasing numbers of people are migrating to Germany. The BKA's equation appears to be simple: More migrants equals more crimes committed by migrants.

But this explanation is not sufficient. Around 13.9 million foreign nationals were registered in Germany in 2023, compared to around 14.1 million in 2024. This is a slight increase of 1.4% at best. However, the proportion of foreign suspects in violent crimes rose by 7.5% during the same period, which is significantly higher than the increase in number of people who migrated to Germany. 

Asylum-seekers are particularly frequent offenders

Asylum-seekers are particularly likely to commit crimes. In 2024, they accounted for around 18% of suspects, although they only make up around 4% of the population. Here, too, the BKA seems to have difficulties in clearly naming the problem. It refers to people in the asylum system as «immigrants» or «persons seeking protection.»
However, the term «persons seeking protection» does not adequately describe the reality. Asylum seekers come to Germany for various reasons and initially pass through other countries where they could also find protection. Ultimately, what they are seeking in Germany is not protection, but a better life.

The term implies a certain moral obligation that is often not given, which makes it problematic. Especially for an authority that is supposed to be ideologically neutral.
The term «migrants» as it is used in crime statistics is also misleading. In the statistics, this refers exclusively to people in the asylum system. However, in common usage, the term is also understood to refer to people who are not seeking asylum, for instance an IT specialist from India who entered the country legally. This gives the impression that the state does not want to describe things as they really are.

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In 2023, around 39% of those convicted did not have a German passport – a new high. An analysis by the Federal Statistical Office from 2021 even showed that around 45% of convicted murder or manslaughter offenders were foreign nationals. 

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