Germany's president has been leading a memorial service for the victims of a knife attack last weekend in the western city of zolan President Frank Walter Stein Meer says the violence has shaken the country to its core and he's called for a more consistent political approach to refugees and Asylum Seekers Chancellor Olaf Schultz is also attending the service three people died when a man attacked a crowd of people at a festival the suspect is a failed Asylum Seeker from Syria who was supposed to be deported from Germany we can now hear a little bit of the German president's remarks we must make every effort to enforce the immigration rules that already exist and that are now being established that is a huge undertaking that must have priority in the coming years we will need the efforts of the state as a whole this is what I expect and what the people of our country expect Beyond partisan Frontiers and across all levels of Public Authority this is a matter for which the Democratic forces in our country must take responsibility and for more on today's memorial service in the city of zolan I'm joined in the studio by DW's political correspondent Hans brand hello to you Hans so I know you were listening to the full speech by German president Frank VOR Stein Meer um what stood out for you I think what's notable is uh the extent to which this particular attack really um struck home in Germany uh TR talked a lot about the fact that Germany actually sees itself as an open society that welcomes people from foreign countries and uh that Prides itself on being an open society and that this openness and this sense of Welcome had been in some sense betrayed and that's a feeling of betrayal also that one feels particularly in the city of zingan not least because there was another attack there 30 years ago which was uh committed by uh right wiers against immigrants at that time so zing in some sense feels persecuted by the these kinds of VI this kind of violence um yes the trauma of German society that was caused by this uh by this attack I think is notable we've also seen how this attack has reignited the debate on migration in Germany about the entire Asylum system is this going to represent some sort of turning point for migration policy in this country well obviously migration policy has been controversially discussed for many years and fact and uh what did happen now after this attack in the past week is that the current government of Chancellor Olaf Schultz and his Coalition Partners from the greens and the market liberal fre Democrats finally agreed to um an increase uh increasing measures uh to restrict migration to Germany and to try and get people that are here illegally to leave the country this is something they couldn't agree on for many many months and under the pressure of this attack but also under the pressure of the regional elections that are taking place actually today where migration is a a very serious a very prominent issue amongst opposition parties under this pressure all of these things happened so in that sense it was a turning point yes but how do you think the German public is viewing these measures by the German government is it enough are people going to be satisfied that there's been like a further tightening of migration and Asylum rules or do you expect this debate to continue to fester in the country it will continue the debate will continue it's uh certainly I think the people who are critical of the government especially from the far right but also from the far left on the issue of migration will not be satisfied by the measures that they that have been taken now they feel that that will be too little too late and that they would demand much much harsher measures uh while German society as a whole I think is still open to migration is still welcoming migrants and so there will be many people as well uh especially uh within the sort of center Liberal um Society uh who will feel that some of these measures might actually go too far already that includes for instance a deportation recently also this week by chance uh of migrants to to Afghanistan which had been planned for several weeks ahead and uh took place just the last in the last couple of days DW's Hans brand thank you so very much for your analysis appreciate it