07 December 2015

Germany records 964,000 new asylum seekers since Jan

Germany registered 964,574 new asylum seekers in the first 11 months of the year, putting Europe's top economy on track for a million arrivals in 2015, official figures showed Monday.

Some 206,101 migrants came in November alone, a new monthly record, up from a previous high of 181,166 in October, according to the interior ministry.

The number of arrivals for the year so far was more than four times the total for all of 2014 with Germany now the top European destination for people fleeing conflict, repression and misery in the Middle East, Asia and Africa.

The data did not provide a breakdown of the nationalities of the new arrivals.

In previous months, Syrians topped the figures, with around one in three applications coming from citizens of the war-torn country, for whom Germany has adopted an open-door policy. [AFP] Read more