With almost one million refugees now registered in government computer systems the chancellor and CDU leader is facing resistance in her homeland over her stance on refugees also from her own party.
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German Chancellor Angela Merkel is seen on a video screen during the speech of Bavarian Governor Horst Seehofer during the Christian Democratic, CDU, party convention in Karlsruhe, Germany, Tuesday, Dec. 15, 2015.
“We want to, and we will, noticeably reduce the number of refugees”, she said to applause at the congress in Karlsruhe, in the southwestern state of Baden-Wuerttemberg, which holds a state election next March.
But on Monday she received an eight minute standing ovation and plaudits from media commentators after her speech at the conference.
Eastern European states in particular are opposed to an agreement earlier this year to redistribute 160,000 refugees who are already in frontline states like Italy and Greece and to resettle thousands more Syrian refugees directly from Turkey. “That would overburden Germany”.
“It was important”, said Tobias Bringman, a party member from Stuttgart.
Merkel defended her catch phrase “wir schaffen das”, or “we can do this”, by saying the party must show its Christian roots, and she likened it to pledges made by former conservative chancellors Konrad Adenauer and Helmut Kohl in troubled times.
In comments The Guardian translated into English, Merkel said refugees will have to make an effort to assimilate into German society. “She is also highly regarded in Germany – and I stress also in Bavaria”.
Merkel reaffirmed her position that the region must work together to overcome its worst refugee crisis since World War II and called on party members to support a resolution that calls for reducing the influx into Germany while rejecting a cap on migrants.
But the Bavarians’ angry response to Merkel’s decision in September to open the borders to Syrian refugees led Seehofer to chastise chancellor at her traditional guest appearance at the CSU congress in Munich last month.
“At the same time we took on board the concerns of the people, who are anxious about the future, and this means we want to reduce, we want to drastically decrease the number of people coming to us”, Merkel told the broadcaster ARD.
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A poll by Emnid on Sunday put support for her conservative alliance of the CDU and their Bavarian allies at 37 percent, down from 43 percent in mid-August.
