Minister for Refugees, Immigrants and Integration (Denmark)

Minister for Refugees, Immigrants and Integration of Denmark (Danish: Minister for flygtninge, indvandrere og integration) is a Danish ministerial office, often abbreviated as "Minister for Integration" (Danish: Integrationsminister) . The office was created by Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen on 27 November 2001 when he formed the Cabinet of Anders Fogh Rasmussen I after the 2001 Danish parliamentary election, in which refugees, immigration, and integration of people from non-western countries had been important issues.

One of stated goals of the Anders Fogh cabinet, and especially the supporting Danish People's Party which secured the governments majority, was to "stem the flow" of refugees to Denmark, and new tougher rules did drastically reduce the number of refugees being granted asylum. Another initiative was the 24 year rule, which stated that husbands/wives must be 25 or older before they could immigrate to Denmark through family reunification (there had been many cases of arranged marriages of young people being used to get around immigration restrictions).

It was abolished when the right wing government lost the election of 2011.

List of Ministers of Refugees, Immigration and Integration

• Bertel Haarder (27 November 2001 - 18 February 2005)
• Rikke Hvilshøj (18 February 2005 - 23 November 2007)
• Birthe Rønn Hornbech (23 November 2007 – 8 March 2011)
• Søren Pind (8 March 2011 – 3 October 2011)

External links

• Ministeriet for Flygtninge, indvandrere og Integration - Official homepage
• History of the Ministry. From its official homepage

References

• Tørre tal om indvandrere og kriminalitet - from Danmarks Statistik.
• Årbog om udlændinge i Danmark 2001 - From the Ministry of the Interior.