Germany pledges 6 bn euros as France will take 24,000 refugees

Germany pledged billions in new funds for refugees today, as Chancellor Angela Merkel said the tens of thousands of people flowing into her country in Europe's biggest migrant crisis in decades would lead to profound change.
As European leaders stepped up efforts to tackle the historic crisis, France also said it would take 24,000 more asylum-seekers under a European plan to relocate 120,000 refugees from hard-hit frontline countries.
Meanwhile, the poor and desperate kept coming, both on the land corridor through Turkey and the Balkans and on overcrowded boats in the Mediterranean on journeys that have claimed thousands of lives this year.

Underscoring the danger brought home so graphically by last week's picture of three-year-old Aylan lying drowned in the surf, a Greek passenger ferry today sent its lifeboats to rescue 61 migrants whose boat was at risk of sinking off Lesbos island.
And migrants rescued by Italian coastguards yesterday said five of their group were still missing.
Merkel, at a joint news conference with her vice- chancellor, said: "What we are experiencing now is something that will ... Change our country in coming years."

"We want the change to be positive, and we believe we can accomplish that."
Germany is expecting at least 10,000 more refugees to arrive today, an official in the south of the country said, after 20,000 entered over the weekend.

Merkel hailed as "breathtaking" the emotional and warm welcome given to thousands of migrants who arrived in packed trains in Germany after a gruelling odyssey through Hungary and Austria.
Germany was now seen by many abroad as a place of "hope", Merkel said, after citizens turned up in large numbers to shower the new arrivals with gifts, cash and toys.
Europe's top economy - which expects 800,000 asylum requests this year, four times last year's total - faces extra costs estimated at 10 billion euros (USD 11 billion) this year and next.
Merkel said that the federal government would contribute six billion euros for new shelters, extra police and language training in 2016.

However, despite German solidarity, Merkel stressed that other EU countries must take in more migrants because "only with common European solidarity can we master this effort".