‘We love Germany’

MUNICH, Germany: “We love Germany”, several young migrants yelled happily as they stumbled out of a train in Munich — the last stop, they hope, of their long and perilous journey from war.
Whatever fatigue and fear they had was wiped away by the relief of having reached Germany, and seeing a welcoming crowd of people holding up banners reading “Welcome!”
“Thank you Germany!”, chanted the new arrivals in return.
Women and children were among the hundreds who had travelled on foot, by boat, bus and train, fleeing war in countries including Syria and Somalia in recent weeks and months.
“We are happy to have made it to Munich. But now we are tired, just really tired,” said one Syrian woman, dark rings under her eyes, who had fled Aleppo with her husband and three children.
Another man from the same devastated city said: “We could no longer live there.” He was carrying two children in his arms, aged around three and four. Standing beside him was his wife, who had another toddler in her arms and a boy holding her hand.
Germany has become the top destination for migrants seeking refuge in Europe, and expects to receive 800,000 this year, a record number and four times as many as in 2014.
Syrians in particular are trying to get to Europe’s biggest economy, as Berlin has eased asylum-seeking procedures for those fleeing the brutal civil war.
German police registered a record 2,200 migrant arrivals in the country’s key southern border region with Austria in the 24 hours to Tuesday morning. Arrivals spiked as passenger trains, each packed with hundreds of refugees, left Hungary and crossed through Austria to head into Germany’s southern Bavaria State.