Denmark to limit 'non-Western' residents in neighbourhoods to 30 per cent

Migrants, many of them from Syria, walk to police vans after Danish police found them while checking the identity papers of passengers on a train arriving from Germany in 2016. Photo / AP

Denmark has announced it will limit "non-Western" residents from forming more than 30 per cent of any neighbourhood - but have pulled back from using the controversial term "ghetto".

Danish Interior Minister Kaare Dybvad Bek said the law was designed to avoid "the emergence of religious and cultural parallel societies" and is part of nation's hardline immigration policies, which are some of the most restrictive in Europe.

The new bill is a review of existing laws which were enacted to combat the formation of "ghettoes".

That term has been scrapped in this latest iteration, with Bek saying in a statement: "The term ghetto is misleading ... I think it contributes to eclipsing the large amount of work that needs doing in these neighbourhoods."

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Previously, the term was used to define any area with a population greater than 1000 where more than half of residents were of "non-Western origin which also met at least two of four other criteria.

The criteria are:

• More than 40 per cent unemployment
• More than 60 per cent of 39-50 year-olds with no upper secondary education
• Crime rates three times higher than the national average
• An average gross income 55 per cent lower than the regional average

Currently, 15 Danish neighbourhoods fall into this category and residents are subject to harsher application of certain laws.

For those residents, misdemeanours carry double the legal penalties seen elsewhere in Denmark and daycare is mandatory for all children over the age of 1, or benefits are withdrawn.

Driven by challenges from the Right, Denmark's ruling centre-Left Social Democratics have firmly pursued anti-immigration policies in recent years.

Danish police officers patrol the German-Danish border crossing near Flensburg, northern Germany, Monday, Jan. 4, 2016. Photo / AP

Earlier this month, Denmark told some of its Syrian migrants to return to their war-torn home, insisting it was now safe.

Ninety-four Syrian refugees were stripped of citizenship and now face life in a deportation camp or a return home.

Immigration Minister Mattias Tesfaye said last month: "We have made it clear to the Syrian refugees that their residence permit is temporary. It can be withdrawn if protection is no longer needed," the Daily Telegraph reported.

"We must give people protection for as long as it is needed. But when conditions in the home country improve, a former refugee should return home and re-establish a life there," he said.