According to recent figures released by the International Organization for Migration (IOM), over 924,140 refugees have reached Europe's shores so far this year while more than 3,670 people have either died or gone missing in their perilous journey to the continent.Merkel has come under pressure both at home and in the European Union (EU) for her open-door policy in accepting hundreds of thousands of refugees. Despite pressures and her popularity drop in recent months, Merkel insisted that Germany has a "moral and political" duty as the top economic power of Europe to help people fleeing the war-torn Syria. "We will live up to our humanitarian responsibility," she added.
Germany, Europe's top destination for refugees, is expecting to receive around one million asylum seekers, who are mainly from conflict-hit zones in the Middle East and Africa. Conservative critics of Merkel have urged her to decrease the number of refugees ahead of the country's elections scheduled for March. They say the open-door policy on refugees would endanger her hopes of winning a fourth term in 2017.
European countries reportedly remain divided over how to deal with the refugees, most of whom are fleeing conflict-hit zones in the Middle East and Africa. While a few European leaders support an open-door refugee policy, others prefer controlling the external borders of the EU, deporting more people and paying third countries to keep asylum seekers on their soil.
Western countries' policies are largely to blame for Europe's refugee crisis, analysts say, as these states and their allies have been supporting militants who are wrecking havoc in conflict-hit countries in the Middle East, including Syria, as well as North Africa.
"German Dream" to poor people , thus sitting back and relax , while new cheap labor takes the place of the old one, that is Germany. Funny how the villains always find was to stay on top of the global socio-economic pyramid.