Weekly political overview
Authorized English-language form for rental contracts. The Ministry of Housing has made an executive order to create a legal form for rental contracts in English. The executive order will come into force in the first quarter of 2025. Until now, some landlords were adding English translations to the official rental contract, but they had no legal value. This is a big win after more than a decade of lobbying from multiple organizations.
Greenlandic language vs. Parliament: take two. After a lengthy conflict and strong stances in Parliament by Greenlandic member Aki-Matilda Høegh-Dam, it was agreed to introduce simultaneous interpretation of Greenlandic for selected debates. Not a full win, but a victory nonetheless for the Greenlandic minority. 3.5 million DKK will be invested to prepare infrastructure and hire four interpreters. Does this open the way for other languages in Parliament? Only time will tell.
A 29-year-old was charged with promoting terrorism online. He made more than a thousand posts promoting the far-right group Terrorgram. Via social media and other communication channels, he incited violence against non-white people and promoted Nazi propaganda.
Congratulations to Romania and Bulgaria on joining the Schengen Area.
Proposals from political parties
- Moderaterne (Social Liberals) want to end the citizenship value-alignment interviews, which were recently enforced on some applicants, despite it happening outside of the legal framework. They find them irrelevant, as the conditions to fulfill citizenship are already tough enough. Socialdemokratiet (Social Democrats) agree that the interviews can become time-consuming if every successful applicant needs to come in front of Parliament to defend themselves. The scheme will be reviewed at the start of 2025.
Snapshots from the political stage
- During “Question Time with the Prime Minister,” the leader of the DF (National Conservative) requested that Denmark relax the support provided to Ukraine and, if possible, end it soon. This is the first time a parliamentary party has taken an anti-Ukraine stance in Denmark. The prime minister shot down the idea, saying that the current times are more dangerous than the Cold War and that we must protect those on the front lines who defend us all.
Focus
The Russian-backed dictator of Syria has fallen. Why is this important for us? There are 45,000 Syrians in Denmark (a large majority arrived as refugees at the start of the conflict more than a decade ago). As you can imagine, several politicians have already started to ask when the Syrian refugees will go home and rebuild their country. The Minister of Integration expects that many of them will return home and plans to provide repatriation support in the near future. However, the decision rests with the Refugee Board (Flygtningenævnet), which will make an announcement on January 16.
- The fall of the Bashar al-Assad regime is a big loss for Russia. In 2015, they invested a lot of money and manpower to keep him in power, which triggered the refugee wave to Europe. They will be forced to retreat from the military bases established in Syria.
- Iran is losing an important playground previously used to funnel weapons to terrorist groups.
- China recently signed a “Syrian-Chinese strategic partnership” with the dictator, only to see him dethroned days later.
- Israel used the first 24 hours of the fall to attack more than 500 military targets in Syria to prevent them from falling into the hands of “terrorists.”
- For Türkiye, the news is both good and bad. Good, because they house 3.2 million Syrian refugees. Bad, because there is a good chance that the state of Kurdistan will be born soon, which Erdogan strongly opposes.
- As the USA is not likely to help, the burden of rebuilding Syria will probably fall on—you guessed right—the European Union. There are economic opportunities in rebuilding a war-torn country and establishing an EU-friendly state in the Middle East, so most likely we will undertake the task.
- Don’t forget, 16 million Syrians are in need of emergency help. Within the ruins, bread, oil, and butter are luxury items. Denmark has already pledged 50 million DKK to nudge the rest of the world, but a lot more is needed to help them survive the winter.
Words from the editor: When you spend a decade away from your original country, a decade in a new home—I mean, imagine, a decade is a really long time—you tend to rebuild your life from scratch. For some of the refugees, Denmark has been the only place they have ever known—the place where they spent their childhood or teenage years. Now, to receive an order that it is time to pack up and return to a, well, ruined country, it must hurt a lot. On one hand, they can be happy that the dictator is gone, but on the other, it can be overwhelming to think about returning to a place you can barely recognize anymore. What can we do? Show compassion to your Syrian neighbors.
