Germany on course for 1 million asylum-seekers

PanARMENIAN.Net - Germany has registered 964,574 new asylum-seekers in the first 11 months of the year, putting it on course for more than a million in 2015, according to BBC News.

The number of migrants arriving has not slowed despite the winter cold, with a record high of 206,101 in November.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel said in August that the country expected 800,000 asylum-seekers over the year. Documents leaked in October suggested the government was privately anticipating the arrival of up to 1.5m.

Germany has registered more asylum-seekers than any other nation in Europe, although at about 1% of its population, less per capita than several smaller nations.

Registered asylum seekers are not always accepted however, and rates of success vary from country to country. Fewer than 10% of applicants last year in Hungary - which has one of the highest shares of asylum-seekers in Europe - resulted in a positive decision.

The rate in Germany was 42%, while in Sweden - which registered the highest number of applications per capita - it was 77%. Across the EU, the success rate about 45%.

The number of arrivals in Germany so far this year is four times the total for all of 2014. The figures for November do not contain a breakdown by nationality, but in previous months Syrians, for whom Germany has adopted an open-door policy, have been the largest group at around a third.

The country looks set to receive less than a top estimate of 1.5m reported in October by German newspaper Bild, citing leaked government documents. A spokesman for the government denied any knowledge of the document.

Meanwhile, the UN refugee agency (UNHCR) said the number of migrants crossing the Mediterranean to Europe fell by more than a third in November, due to poor weather and a Turkish crackdown on people smugglers.