Excerpt:
Vice-Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel said on Monday that up to a million refugees could arrive in Germany in 2015 – a huge step up from current official estimates of 800,000 asylum applications.
"A lot points to the idea that this year we won't take on 800,000 refugees as the Interior Ministry has predicted, but a million," Gabriel wrote to Social Democratic Party (SPD) members in a letter seen by dpa.
But an Interior Ministry spokesman told Bild that the official estimate remains 800,000 asylum applications in this year, although he added that "it's in the nature of a forecast that it's only a forecast."