Berlin is suffering from a shortage of proper burial sites for Muslims, according to media reports. 

Back in 2010, the Berlin-Brandenburg Office for Statistics reported that as many as 420,000 Muslims lived in Berlin, which would have equated to 11 percent of the population. And that was before the 2015 migration wave and subsequent years of mass migration. 

Now, with residents dying and Islam calling for Muslims to be buried as soon as possible, the city is finding it difficult to accommodate demand. And these burials have multiple requirements. 

According to their religion, graves must be oriented towards Mecca, cremation is prohibited, and the body is to be buried without a coffin and as quickly as possible, per a report from rbb​​24. The portal says that demand for such burial plots in Berlin is around 2,000 per year.

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A man interviewed by rbb24 says in one case, the deceased’s home country of Turkey was too far away. Plus, his family would not be able to visit his grave. 

“It’s a big challenge for us, of course, to provide areas as needed,” he says, adding that especially in a city like Berlin, “cemetery areas are not always available.”

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There are also time constraints on the part of cemeteries, which create issues.

“That can be very burdensome for the community if they have to wait a week to be buried with their loved ones or relatives,” another person states in the video. 

In 2024, a report out of Migazin reported on the same concerns, writing that only a few of the city’s more than 200 cemeteries had designated burial plots for Muslims. 

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By 2023, for example, approximately 9,000 Muslims had been buried at the Gatow Landscape Cemetery; however, due to a lack of space, the cemetery faces repeated suspensions of burials. The article also highlighted issues due to the strict requirements of Islamic burials, which often require interment in fresh earth (without a coffin), exacerbating space issues at existing cemeteries. 

Due to the ongoing shortage, relatives are sometimes transferred to cemeteries outside Berlin or to their countries of origin, a situation many Muslims are seeking to address. 

Last summer, Remix News ran a report on an interview by Thilo Sarrazin, the former Bundesbank board member who wrote “Deutschland schafft sich ab” (“Germany Is Abolishing Itself”). He predicts that by 2070, roughly 80 percent of all births will be to non-German mothers, with the majority being Muslim.