Over two thirds of foreign children were born here. The Federal Republic has proved itself to be an open society not only by taking in asylum-seekers and war refugees. It has also always been a champion of free movement of labor, freedom of occupation and freedom of establishment within the European Union.

Approximately 2.4 million German repatriates from the countries of the former East bloc, especially from the territory of the former Soviet Union, have come to the Federal Republic of Germany since 1987; in 1 996 they numbered 178,000.

Germany’s willingness to open its doors to foreigners who have been persecuted on political grounds is unparalleled. The new Article 1 6a of the Basic Law, like the former Article 16, still guarantees protection from political persecution in the form of an individual basic right. In 1992, for instance, Germany alone took in nearly 80 percent of all people seeking asylum in the whole of the European Community. In 1989 the number of foreigners seeking asylum in Germany was 121,318; in 1991 the figure rose to 256,112 and in 1992 to 438,191. At the same time the proportion of those who could be recognized as genuine victims of political persecution fell to less than five percent. In 1 993, up to the end of August, some 322,600 asylum-seekers entered Germany.

Their number fell significantly when the new legislation on the right of asylum became effective on 1 July 1993: Only 127,210 people sought asylum in 1994, 127,937 in 1995 and 116,367 in 1996. Under the new constitutional amendment that has been in force since 1 July 1993 (the “asylum compromise”), which was carried by a two-thirds majority in parliament and was upheld as constitutional by the Federal Constitutional Court in May 1996, the right of asylum has been focused on its true purpose - which is the normal state of affairs in other countries - of affording protection to those who actually have been persecuted on political grounds and really do need protection. As a result, foreigners who enter Germany from a safe third country may no longer invoke this basic right. Germany also reserves the right, notwithstanding the Geneva Convention relating to the Status of Refugees, to draw up a list of countries where, according to official sources of information, no one is subject topersecution so that there is, as a rule, no ground for asylum. Nonetheless, every person whose application for asylum has been rejected may appeal, if necessary rightthrough to the Federal Constitutional Court.