Tag Archives: Germany

At least two dead in explosion at German BASF chemical plant

Firefighters trying to extinguish the chemical fire

FRANKFURT (Reuters) – At least two people died and six were severely injured on Monday in an explosion and fire at chemicals maker BASF’s biggest production site in Germany, the company said.

Two people are still missing, BASF said.

The explosion occurred on a supply line connecting a harbor and a tank depot on the Ludwigshafen site at around 1120 local time (0920 GMT), according to BASF, the world’s biggest chemicals company.

A fire that broke out following the blast sent up plumes of smoke for hours, prompting BASF and the city of Ludwigshafen to urge residents in the surrounding area to avoid going outside and to keep their windows and doors shut.

Measurements taken in the area so far have indicated no risk from toxic fumes, BASF said.

“We deeply regret that employees died and several people were injured. Our sympathy is with the affected people and their families,” the Ludwigshafen site’s chief, Uwe Liebelt, said in a statement.

The company said it was unclear so far what caused the explosion. BASF also said it could not say what financial impact the explosion might have.

It shut down 14 facilities, including its two steam crackers, large units that make basic chemical components, for safety reasons and because the supply of raw materials was disrupted by the blast.

The Ludwigshafen site, around 80 kilometers (50 miles) south of Frankfurt, is the world’s largest chemical complex, covering an area of 10 square kilometers (four square miles) and employing 39,000 workers, according to BASF. It is located on the Rhine river and receives many of its raw materials by ship.

The harbor at which the explosion occurred is a terminal for combustible fluids such as naphtha and methanol that are important for BASF’s supply of raw materials.

News of the explosion came less than two hours after BASF said four people were injured in a gas explosion at its Lampertheim facility, a plant near Ludwigshafen that makes additives for plastics.

(Reporting by Jans Hack and Maria Sheahan; Editing by Larry King and Jane Merriman)

Merkel wants Germany to get refugees into workforce faster

Refugees show their skills in metal processing works during a media tour at a workshop for refugees organized by German industrial group Siemens in Berlin, Germany,

By Georgina Prodhan and Andreas Rinke

FRANKFURT/BERLIN (Reuters) – Chancellor Angela Merkel said on Thursday that Germany needed “viable solutions” to integrate refugees into the workforce faster after she met blue-chip companies that have hired just over 100 refugees since around a million arrived last year.

Merkel, her popularity undermined by her open-door policy, summoned the bosses of some of Germany’s biggest companies to Berlin on Wednesday to account for their lack of action and exchange ideas about how they can do better.

Many of the companies contend that a lack of German-language skills, the inability of most refugees to prove any qualifications and uncertainty about their permission to stay in the country mean there is little they can do in the short term.

Merkel told rbb-inforadio that if needed, special provisions could be developed to speed up the integration of refugees into the workforce, but she acknowledged this would still take time.

“Many are in integration courses or waiting to get on them. So I think we will need to show some patience, but must be ready at any time to develop viable solutions,” she said.

A participant at the meeting with Merkel said company executives from DAX firms and small businesses discussed their opinions for 2-1/2 hours and came to the conclusion: “We want to do this”. When talking about the refugee influx, Merkel frequently says: “Wir schaffen das” or “we can do this”.

The meeting spurred some firms to announce more action to help get refugees into the workforce.

Deutsche Bahn [DBN.UL] boss Ruediger Grube said IT would offer 150 extra places in qualification programs for refugees, Volkswagen said it was working with Kiron, a non-profit start-up, to help refugees start a university degree, Thyssenkrupp announced around 150 extra training positions and Daimler announced 50, the source said.

“Wir Zusammen” or “We Together”, an integration initiative of German companies, said much had been achieved to support the arrival of the newcomers but now they had to turn their attention to integrating them into the workforce.

“Now it’s about motivating those companies that are not yet active,” it said in a statement after the summit.

A survey by Reuters of the 30 companies in Germany’s stock index last week found they could point to just 63 refugee hires in total.

Of those, 50 were employed by Deutsche Post DH, which said it applied a “pragmatic approach” and deployed the refugees to sort and deliver letters and parcels.

“Given that around 80 percent of asylum seekers are not highly qualified and may not yet have a high level of German proficiency, we have primarily offered jobs that do not require technical skills or a considerable amount of interaction in German,” a company spokesman said by email.

Deutsche Post’s Chief Executive Frank Appel said on Wednesday the company had now hired more refugees, taking its total to 102.

Several of the 27 firms who responded said they considered it discriminatory to ask about applicants’ migration history, so they did not know whether they employed refugees or how many.

What is clear is that early optimism that the wave of migrants might boost economic growth and help ease a skills shortage in Germany – where the working-age population is projected to shrink by 6 million people by 2030 – is evaporating.

“The employment of refugees is no solution for the skills shortage,” industrial group Thyssenkrupp’s Chief Executive Heinrich Hiesinger said earlier this month.

APPRENTICESHIP BARRIERS

Most large German companies, especially those in manufacturing, prefer to hire through structured apprenticeship programs, in which they train young people for up to four years for highly skilled and sometimes company-specific jobs.

But the recent arrivals from Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere are mainly ill-prepared for such training, they say.

The DAX-listed companies surveyed by Reuters were able to identify about 200 apprentices in this or last year’s intake. Many will have been through months of pre-training especially designed for migrants by large companies, such as engineering group Siemens, Mercedes maker Daimler, or automotive technology firm Continental.

Two Syrian interns visited by Reuters at a Siemens power-plant construction site in April applied for apprenticeships, but could not immediately be accepted because they are still in the process of proving their school-leaving qualifications. One is meantime doing temporary work in IT and the other taking German classes.

It is simply too soon to expect large numbers of refugees to have been hired yet, most German companies say.

“Our experience is that it takes a minimum of 18 months for a well-trained refugee to go through the asylum procedure and learn German at an adequate level in order to apply for a job,” said a spokeswoman for Deutsche Telekom.

(Additional reporting by Caroline Copley, Michelle Martin, Paul Carrel, Andreas Rinke and Markus Wacket in Berlin, Jan Schwartz in Hamburg, Matthias Inverardi in Duesseldorf and Harro ten Wolde, Ludwig Burger, Edward Taylor and Tina Bellon in Frankfurt; editing by Ralph Boulton)

North Korea conducts fifth and largest nuclear test, drawing broad condemnation

South Korean emergency meeting

* Test seen as North’s most powerful yet

* Japan protests, sends jets to monitor for radiation

* China begins emergency radiation testing

* South accuses North of “maniacal recklessness”

* UN Security Council to hold closed-door meeting Friday –
dips

(Adds UN, CTBTO estimate, further condemnations)

By Ju-min Park and Jack Kim

SEOUL, Sept 9 (Reuters) – North Korea conducted its fifth
and biggest nuclear test on Friday and said it had mastered the
ability to mount a warhead on a ballistic missile, ratcheting up
a threat that its rivals and the United Nations have been
powerless to contain.

The blast, on the 68th anniversary of North Korea’s
founding, was more powerful than the bomb dropped on Hiroshima,
according to some estimates, and drew condemnation from the
United States as well as China, Pyongyang’s main ally.

Diplomats said the United Nations Security Council would
discuss the test at a closed-door meeting on Friday, at the
request of the United States, Japan and South Korea.

Under 32-year-old dictator Kim Jong Un, North Korea has
accelerated the development of its nuclear and missile
programmes, despite U.N. sanctions that were tightened in March
and have further isolated the impoverished country.

South Korean President Park Geun-hye, in Laos after a summit
of Asian leaders, said Kim was showing “maniacal recklessness”
in completely ignoring the world’s call to abandon his pursuit
of nuclear weapons.

U.S. President Barack Obama, aboard Air Force One on his way
home from Laos, said the test would be met with “serious
consequences”, and held talks with Park and with Japanese Prime
Minister Shinzo Abe, the White House said.

China said it was resolutely opposed to the test and urged
Pyongyang to stop taking any actions that would worsen the
situation. It said it would lodge a protest with the North
Korean embassy in Beijing.

There were further robust condemnations from Russia, the
European Union, NATO, Germany and Britain.

North Korea, which labels the South and the United States as
its main enemies, said its “scientists and technicians carried
out a nuclear explosion test for the judgment of the power of a
nuclear warhead,” according to its official KCNA news agency.

It said the test proved North Korea was capable of mounting
a nuclear warhead on a medium-range ballistic missile, which it
last tested on Monday when Obama and other world leaders were
gathered in China for a G20 summit.

Pyongyang’s claims of being able to miniaturise a nuclear
warhead have never been independently verified.

Its continued testing in defiance of sanctions presents a
challenge to Obama in the final months of his presidency and
could become a factor in the U.S. presidential election in
November, and a headache to be inherited by whoever wins.

“Sanctions have already been imposed on almost everything
possible, so the policy is at an impasse,” said Tadashi Kimiya,
a University of Tokyo professor specialising in Korean issues.

“In reality, the means by which the United States, South
Korea and Japan can put pressure on North Korea have reached
their limits,” he said.

UNPRECEDENTED RATE

North Korea has been testing different types of missiles at
an unprecedented rate this year, and the capability to mount a
nuclear warhead on a missile is especially worrisome for its
neighbours South Korea and Japan.

“The standardisation of the nuclear warhead will enable the
DPRK to produce at will and as many as it wants a variety of
smaller, lighter and diversified nuclear warheads of higher
strike power,” KCNA said, referring to the country’s formal
name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.

It was not clear whether Pyongyang had notified Beijing or
Moscow of its planned nuclear test. Senior officials from
Pyongyang were in both capitals this week.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said she
had no information to provide when asked if China had advance
warning of the test, and would not be drawn on whether China
would support tougher sanctions against its neighbour.

Although Beijing has criticised North Korea’s nuclear and
missile tests, it has repeatedly expressed anger since the
United States and South Korea decided in July to deploy the
Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) anti-missile system
in the South.

China calls THAAD a threat to its own security and will do
nothing to bring North Korea back to the negotiating table on
its nuclear programme.

Preliminary data collected by the Vienna-based Comprehensive
Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO), which monitors
nuclear tests around the world, indicates the magnitude – around
5 – of the seismic event detected in North Korea on Friday was
greater than a previous one in January.

Jeffrey Lewis of the California-based Middlebury Institute
of International Studies said the highest estimates of seismic
magnitude suggested this was North Korea’s most powerful nuclear
test so far.

He said the seismic magnitude and surface level indicated a
blast with a 20- to 30-kilotonne yield. Such a yield would make
this test larger than the nuclear bomb dropped by the United
States on the Japanese city of Hiroshima in World War Two.

“That’s the largest DPRK test to date, 20-30kt, at least.
Not a happy day,” Lewis told Reuters.

South Korea’s military put the force of the blast at 10
kilotonnes, which would still be the North’s most powerful
nuclear blast to date.

“The important thing is, that five tests in, they now have a
lot of nuclear test experience. They aren’t a backwards state
any more,” Lewis said.

(Reporting by Jack Kim, Ju-min Park, James Pearson, Se Young
Lee, Nataly Pak, and Yun Hwan Chae in SEOUL; Additional
reporting by Ben Blanchard in BEIJING, Kaori Kaneko and Linda
Sieg in TOKYO, Kirsti Knolle in VIENNA and Eric Beech and
Michelle Nichols in WASHINGTON; Writing by Tony Munroe; Editing
by Raju Gopalakrishnan and Ian Geoghegan)

German official calls for U.N. sanctions against Syria

A boy rides a bicycle near rubble of damaged buildings in the rebel held al-Maadi district of Aleppo, Syria,

BERLIN (Reuters) – Gernot Erler, the German government’s point man on Russia, urged the United Nations on Thursday to seek sanctions against Syria for two chlorine gas attacks on civilians, despite Moscow’s threat to veto such a measure.

“The United Nations should prepare clear sanctions, despite the Russian veto threat,” Erler told Germany’s Neue Osnabruecker Zeitung in an interview.

“Moscow is obviously more concerned about being seen as a friend of the criminal Assad regime than in taking joint action and sanctions against this provocative treaty violation,” Erler, a member of the Social Democrats, the junior partner in Chancellor Angela Merkel’s coalition, told the newspaper.

An inquiry by the United Nations and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), unanimously authorized by the 15-member Security Council, also found that Islamic State militants used sulfur mustard gas.

“The findings are clear,” Erler said. He added that Russia needed to decide if it wanted to risk international isolation in this case.

Russia, a close ally of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in his war with rebels fighting to topple him, and China have previously protected the Damascus government from Council action by blocking several resolutions, including a bid to refer the conflict in Syria to the International Criminal Court.

The Security Council on Tuesday began to discuss whether to impose sanctions on people or entities linked to two chlorine gas attacks on civilians that the United Nations and the global chemical weapons watchdog blamed on the Syrian government.

The report’s results have set the stage for a Security Council showdown between the five veto-wielding powers, likely pitting Russia and China against the United States, Britain and France over how to respond.

Russian U.N. Ambassador Vitaly Churkin said he is prepared to work with the United States on a response, but that first the council members must exchange analyses of the report, which he described as very complicated.

Syria agreed to destroy its chemical weapons in 2013 under a deal brokered by Moscow and Washington. The Security Council passed a resolution that said in the event of non-compliance, including “the use of chemical weapons by anyone” in Syria, it would impose measures under Chapter 7 of the U.N. Charter, which deals with sanctions.

The Security Council would need to adopt another resolution to impose targeted sanctions – a travel ban and asset freeze – on people or entities linked to the attacks.

(Reporting by Andrea Shalal; editing by Mark Heinrich)

Migrant influx pushes German population growth to highest since 1992

A woman wears an Islamic headdress while visiting Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germ

BERLIN (Reuters) – Germany’s population registered its biggest increase in more than 20 years in 2015, data showed on Friday, as record numbers of migrants entered the country.

More than a million people fleeing war and poverty in the Middle East, Africa and beyond flocked to Europe’s most populous nation last year, drawn by Germany’s strong economy, relatively liberal asylum laws and generous system of benefits.

Net migration reached a record high of 1,139,000, more than doubling from 2014, the Federal Statistics Office said.

A domestic debate about the benefits and drawbacks of migration has been raised a notch by a recent spate of violent attacks on civilians, some of which were claimed by Islamist militants.

Federal elections are due next year and some German politicians have argued the influx will help ease a shortage of skilled labour as the population ages and birth rates fall.

Others are worried such a large number of migrants, many of whom lack the language skills and training Germany needs, is placing a heavy burden on the social safety net.

With 188,000 more people having died in Germany in 2015 than were born, overall the population rose by 978,000 to 82.2 million, its strongest rise since 1992.

The Interior Ministry has said 1.1 million migrants arrived in Germany last year with the aim of seeking asylum, with just under 480,000 applying. Asylum seekers have faced delays in making their applications.

The statistics office said the figures it used to calculate net migration were based on numbers registering at registration offices. Asylum seekers are initially housed in reception centres and generally only register later.

All of Germany’s 16 regions saw their populations increase. Asylum seekers are spread around the country based on each state’s population and tax revenues.

At the end of 2015 there were 8.7 million foreign nationals living in Germany, an increase of 14.7 percent compared with the previous year, with foreigners making up 10.5 percent of the population.

The IAB German labour office research institute estimated on Friday that the number of people who come to Germany in search of protection would fall to around 300,000 to 400,000 this year.

It said that estimate was dependent on the continued existence of the European Union’s migrant deal with Turkey, which aims to stem the flow of illegal migrants to Europe, and the Balkan route remaining closed.

The IAB said the number of new arrivals had stabilised at about 16,000 refugees per month since April. That compares with more than 200,000 in November.

(Reporting by Michelle Martin; additional reporting by Holger Hansen; editing by John Stonestreet and Dominic Evans)

Germany to tell people to stockpile food and water in case of attacks

Police barrier is pictured at the train station in Grafing

BERLIN (Reuters) – For the first time since the end of the Cold War, the German government plans to tell citizens to stockpile food and water in case of an attack or catastrophe, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung newspaper reported on Sunday.

Germany is currently on high alert after two Islamist attacks and a shooting rampage by a mentally unstable teenager last month. Berlin announced measures earlier this month to spend considerably more on its police and security forces and to create a special unit to counter cyber crime and terrorism.

“The population will be obliged to hold an individual supply of food for ten days,” the newspaper quoted the government’s “Concept for Civil Defence” – which has been prepared by the Interior Ministry – as saying.

The paper said a parliamentary committee had originally commissioned the civil defense strategy in 2012.

A spokesman for the Interior Ministry said the plan would be discussed by the cabinet on Wednesday and presented by the minister that afternoon. He declined to give any details on the content.

People will be required to stockpile enough drinking water to last for five days, according to the plan, the paper said.

The 69-page report does not see an attack on Germany’s territory, which would require a conventional style of national defense, as likely.

However, the precautionary measures demand that people “prepare appropriately for a development that could threaten our existence and cannot be categorically ruled out in the future,” the paper cited the report as saying.

It also mentions the necessity of a reliable alarm system, better structural protection of buildings and more capacity in the health system, the paper said.

A further priority should be more support of the armed forces by civilians, it added.

Germany’s Defence Minister said earlier this month the country lay in the “crosshairs of terrorism” and pressed for plans for the military to train more closely with police in preparing for potential large-scale militant attacks.

(Writing by Caroline Copley; Editing by Andrew Bolton)

German conservatives call for partial ban on face veil

A carnival float with papier-mache figures representing women dressed with Burkas, is pictured during the traditional Rose Monday carnival parade in the western German city of Duesseldorf

By Caroline Copley and Michelle Martin

BERLIN (Reuters) – German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservatives have agreed that women should be banned from wearing the face veil in schools and universities and while driving, Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere said on Friday.

The move follows an influx last year of more than 1 million, mainly Muslim, refugees from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan, and growing security fears among the public after two Islamist attacks and a shooting rampage by a mentally unstable teenager.

Regional interior ministers belonging to Merkel’s Christian Democrats (CDU) and her Christian Social Union (CSU) allies presented a declaration in Berlin on tougher security measures, including more police and greater surveillance in public areas.

Among the more disputed proposals is a call for a partial ban on the burqa and niqab garments. Lorenz Caffier, interior minister for the state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, said the full body veil is a barrier to integration, encourages parallel societies and suggests women are inferior.

“We all reject the full veil – not only the burqa but also other types of full veil that only leave the eyes visible … It has no place in our society,” de Maiziere told reporters.

“Baring one’s face is essential for our communication, co-existence and social cohesion and that’s why we’re asking everyone to show their faces. We want to introduce a law to make people show their faces and that means that those who breach that law will have to feel the consequences.”

The conservative interior ministers want to ensure women show their face while driving, when they register with authorities, at passport controls and at demonstrations. They also want civil servants, teachers, students at schools and universities, judges and witnesses in court to be banned from wearing the full veil.

CENTRE-LEFT COALITION PARTNER OPPOSES MOVE

De Maiziere said that the regional interior ministers’ declaration sent a signal that the full veil was not wanted in Germany, although it was not possible to fully ban everything that was undesirable.

The CDU proposals must be adopted by the government before they can become law. The debate over a ban on the face veil has divided Merkel’s ruling coalition; her Social Democrat (SPD) junior coalition partners largely oppose the demands.

The CDU’s calls for a partial ban come as it has lost support to the anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, which says Islam is incompatible with the constitution and wants to ban the burqa and minarets on mosques. The AfD is expected to perform well in regional elections in Berlin and the eastern state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern in September.

SPD Labour Minister Andrea Nahles has said the calls were a sign of an “increasingly xenophobic” political discourse in Germany and could be a serious setback to efforts to integrate immigrants. Justice Minister Heiko Mass, also from the SPD, said debates about the burqa and security should be kept separate.

Germany has nearly four million Muslims, about five percent of the total population.

There are no official statistics on the number of women wearing a burqa – which covers the face and body – in Germany but Aiman Mazyek, leader of its Central Council of Muslims, has said hardly any women wear it.

A study carried out by the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees in 2009 found that more than two-thirds of Muslim women in Germany did not even wear a headscarf. The niqab covers the hair and face except for the eyes.

Public debate about a ban on full body veils has broken out in several European countries since three French Mediterranean cities banned body-covering Muslim burkini swimwear, saying the burkini defies French laws on secularism.

France, which has the largest Muslim minority in Europe, estimated at 5 million, has banned the wearing of the niqab and burqa in public since 2010.

(Reporting by Caroline Copley; Editing by Mark Heinrich)

Munich raises security for beer festival after Islamist attacks

German Police Officers

BERLIN (Reuters) – Organizers of the world’s biggest beer festival, Munich’s Oktoberfest, have raised security after Islamist attacks in Germany last month, including banning rucksacks, introducing security checks at all entrances and erecting fencing.

Drawing some 6 million tourists, the Oktoberfest is a major highlight of the year for residents, who often wear traditional lederhosen or dirndls, and visitors from all over the world travel there. This year’s festival runs from Sept. 17 to Oct. 3.

However, Bavarians are on edge after jihadist militant group Islamic State claimed two attacks in July, one on a train near Wuerzburg and one at a music festival in Ansbach, in which asylum-seekers injured 20 people.

On top of that, an 18-year-old German-Iranian killed nine people in a shooting rampage in a shopping center in Munich.

“We want to do everything we can in terms of security so that the people of Munich and their guests can revel in a relaxed way. We looked at all options,” deputy Munich mayor Josef Schmid told reporters.

The city has increased the number of stewards to as many as 450 from 250 last year and erected a two-meter high metal fence around Theresienwiese, the open ground where the Oktoberfest is held, to ensure nobody can avoid the checks, he said.

The main Munich breweries have their own tents with long beer tables and bands. Last year they served 7.3 million liters of beer, as well as huge quantities of sausages, bretzel and whole spit-roasted bulls.

The Oktoberfest has its origins in the wedding in 1810 of Bavarian Crown Prince Ludwig and Princess Therese of Saxony-Hildburghausen. The public festivities went on for five days and were so popular they have been repeated annually.

(Reporting by Madeline Chambers; Editing by Louise Ireland)

Tiny German bank breaks taboo by charging rich clients for deposits

Raiffeisenbank Gmund

By Alexander Hübner

FRANKFURT (Reuters) – A small cooperative bank in the Bavarian Alps is breaking a German taboo by charging wealthy clients to deposit their money following the European Central Bank’s shift to negative rates.

Raiffeisenbank Gmund on the idyllic Tegernsee lake, home of wealthy actors and sports stars, will apply a custody charge of 0.4 percent to sight deposit accounts over 100,000 euros ($111,500.00) from September, a board member told Reuters. Such accounts allow depositors to withdraw their money at any time.

Several German banks have passed on the ECB’s negative deposit rate to large commercial customers such as companies and institutional investors, but applying the charge to retail customers has been seen as a step too far.

“We have written to all large depositors and recommended that they think things over. If you don’t create an incentive to change things then things don’t change,” Josef Paul said.

Cooperative direct bank Skatbank has applied negative rates on deposits over 500,000 euros since 2014, while ecological lender GLS bank, also part of the cooperative system, is asking customers for a “solidarity contribution” to help offset negative interest rates.

LAST RESORT

The ECB has resorted to a negative deposit rate to try to encourage banks to lend to stimulate Europe’s economy, which is still suffering from the after-effects of the financial crisis. Banks, meanwhile, are seeking to encourage depositors to shift their cash out deposit accounts into other financial products.

Germany’s cooperative banking association BVR said it did not expect other deposit takers in its network to follow Raiffeisenbank Gmund’s lead.

“We don’t believe retail banking will see widespread application of negative rates in Germany, not least because of the intense competitive situation in the German banking market,” the BVR said.

Even in Gmund, the lion’s share of customers are not affected. Paul’s cooperative bank wrote to less than 140 clients, who together hold 40 million euros in deposits, about the new charge, which has already proved effective.

“Some of the customers we informed have opted for alternative investments and others moved their money to other banks,” Paul said, adding that a widening of the charge to less wealthy customers is not planned.

Raiffeisenbank Gmund is one of the country’s smaller cooperative lenders, with six branches and total assets of just 145 million euros. It has a substantial overhang of deposits, only part of which it manages to recycle as loans.

Bavaria’s GVB cooperative banking association, with 269 member banks, backed Gmund’s position.

“The ECB’s extreme monetary policy is creating considerable costs for all banks,” a GVB spokesman said.

“As a last resort, they also have to look at a means to be reimbursed for the cost of deposits,” he said.

(Writing by Jonathan Gould; Editing by Alexander Smith)

Germany has curbed open-door policy for migrants

German Chancellor Angela Merkel addresses a news conference in Berlin, Germany

BERLIN (Reuters) – Germany appears to have drastically curtailed its open-door policy for migrants in 2016, turning away 13,000 people without valid documentation in the first six months, already 4,000 more than in the whole of 2015, official data showed on Tuesday.

Around 117,500 migrants were admitted in the same period, compared to a record of more than one million migrants entering the country last year, mainly across the border from Austria.

The bulk of the rejections happened at land entry points and Afghans, Syrians and Iraqis made up the three largest groups of the total, the Interior Ministry data published at the request of the hard-left Die Linke party showed.

Chancellor Angela Merkel last month interrupted her summer break to defend her government’s migration policy after two Islamist attacks by asylum seekers, saying that those fleeing conflicts and persecution have the right to asylum in Germany.

More than 2,500 Afghans, 1,300 Syrians and 1,000 Iraqis were declined entry at border crossings in the January-June period, the ministry said. Iranians, Moroccans, Nigerians, Pakistanis, Gambians, Somalis and Algerians made up the rest of the top 10.

The number of people seeking asylum in Germany dropped drastically this year as a result of border closures in the Balkans, an EU-Turkey deal to stop sea arrivals in Greece and tougher asylum rules in Germany.

In July, 4,500 migrants arrived in Germany, less than half of the daily arrivals at the peak of the crisis in the fall of last year, German police said earlier this month, bringing the number of arrivals in the first seven months of the year to 122,000.

Migrants who arrive in Germany are first registered at reception centres where they have to wait for months before they can officially file an asylum application, creating a huge backlog and putting strain on civil servants.

The influx has dented the popularity of Merkel’s ruling conservatives and prompted the rise of an anti-immigration party.

Turkey has threatened to suspend its migrants agreement with the European Union if there is no deal to grant visa-free travel to Turks. The number of migrants reach Italy in boats from Libya has also been rising.

(Reporting by Andreas Rinke; Writing by Joseph Nasr; Editing by Raissa Kasolowsky)