Germany deported 23 Afghan men on a Kabul-bound charter flight Tuesday, with the government saying most of those aboard were offenders convicted of violent crimes.

Video published by Bild daily showed the men entering a plane at Leipzig airport before dawn, as several protesters in the terminal held up a banner that read ‘Stop Deportations — Refugees Welcome’.

Germany has accepted millions of refugees and other asylum seekers over the past decade, but chancellor Friedrich Merz has vowed to reverse the trend and stepped up border checks and deportations.

Regarding Afghans, Berlin has prioritised deporting criminal offenders, but in July sent back a first Afghan citizen without a criminal record whose asylum application had been rejected.

The interior ministry said on X that ‘this morning, 23 Afghan men required to leave the country were deported to Kabul on a charter flight.

‘The individuals are largely offenders convicted of serious crimes, including sexual offences and causing bodily injury.’

Interior minister Alexander Dobrindt added that ‘our society has a clear interest in ensuring that criminal offenders leave our country.

He also stressed that ‘anyone who has no right of residence in Germany must expect to leave the country. We are consistently implementing this course of action.’

AFP has asked the interior ministry how many of the 23 Afghan men were convicted offenders, without immediately receiving a response.

The German government does not formally recognise the Taliban, who seized power in Kabul five years ago, but has nonetheless negotiated with Kabul on the deportations.

Merz has said he hopes a tougher immigration policy will help his CDU/CSU alliance — to which Dobrindt also belongs — see off the rising threat of the far-right Alternative for Germany.

Human rights groups criticise the deportations to Afghanistan, where the Taliban authorities impose a strict interpretation of Islamic law, with girls’ education stopping at age 12 and several restrictions focused on women.

The activist group Alliance Against Deportations said about 50 people came to the airport protest against the flight, which it labelled ‘extremely dangerous’ for those on board.

Meanwhile, one million children in Afghanistan are suffering from life-threatening malnutrition in a worsening new crisis hitting the country, the United Nations warned Tuesday.

Across Afghanistan, 3.7 million children suffer from wasting, meaning they are acutely malnourished, the UN children’s agency UNICEF said.

Among that number are ‘one million children who are suffering from life-threatening severe acute malnutrition’ — the worst form, said UNICEF’s Afghanistan country representative Tajudeen Oyewale.

‘If there is no treatment, and we are not able to act fast, that one million number are at risk of dying,’ he told a media briefing in Geneva from Kabul.

Afghanistan has endured repeated hunger crises in recent decades as it has struggled through civil war and other crises. An economic collapse followed the Taliban government’s return to power after US-led forces withdrew in 2021.

He said that nearly 40 per cent of children admitted to hospitals with severe wasting and medical complications were babies under the age of six months old.

Meanwhile children under two years old make up more than 80 per cent of severe acute malnutrition cases in Afghanistan.

‘Malnutrition plays a central role’ in the growing numbers of deaths of very young children, Oyewale said.

He described a ‘worsening nutrition crisis’ across the country, with more than half a million children admitted to hospital so far this year for high risk, moderate and severe wasting.

In July 2025, around 6,000 cases were recorded; in July this year, the numbers went above 8,000 — a third higher.

‘In parts of southern Afghanistan, some hospitals are now seeing three or four severe malnourished children for every available bed,’ he warned.