BERLIN (AP) – Crowds greet trainloads of migrants with applause, candy and toys. A provincial town’s mayor wants to take in more refugees. Top conservative politicians say Germany needs young immigrants.
It’s a contrast with a frosty reception when migrant arrivals in Germany last spiked in the 1990s and mainstream politicians rushed to tighten asylum rules, while the country’s top-selling newspaper asked: “The flood is rising – when will the boat sink?”
Germany expects 800,000 new migrants to arrive this year, nearly twice the previous record. And while attacks on homes for refugees and anti-migrant protests have caused widespread alarm, the broader atmosphere has been strikingly welcoming – illustrated by the weekend’s euphoric scenes in stations from Bavarian metropolis Munich to provincial Saalfeld in which throngs of Germans greeted migrants.
The previous record dates back to 1992, when nearly 440,000 asylum-seekers came as the former Yugoslavia disintegrated – coinciding with a spate of anti-foreigner attacks that shamed Germany.
In perhaps the most notorious incident back then, days of rioting in the eastern city of Rostock saw far-right extremists throw firebombs and stones at a center for refugees, then a neighboring apartment block inhabited by Vietnamese immigrants, as bystanders cheered.