GERMAN Chancellor Angela Merkel pledged Monday to reduce a massive refugee influx but insisted on keeping the door open to the world’s neediest, drawing a rousing standing ovation from her party.

    After weeks of infighting over the expected arrival of around 1 million asylum seekers to Germany this year, Merkel united her conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU) behind a centrist line of generosity with clear limits.

    She drew enthusiastic applause as she repeated her rallying cry “We can do it” during an impassioned hourlong speech, capped by nine minutes in which the nearly 1,000 delegates took to their feet to cheer their chancellor, who beamed and waved from the stage.

    Merkel, 61, appealed to the venerable party’s sense of history, saying that the same strength that allowed it “to rebuild from the rubble of the war to create the economic miracle, and to go from division to a reunified country” would get Germany through the refugee crisis.

    Even in the face of demands from the right wing of the party for an upper limit on newcomers, Merkel insisted Germany would never seal its border.

    She said Germany had a “moral and political” duty as Europe’s top economic power to continue to help the world’s desperate people, particularly those from war-ravaged Syria.

    “We will live up to our humanitarian responsibility,” she said.

    Merkel also insisted she took the concerns of the rank-and-file seriously. “Even a strong country like Germany caan be overwhelmed in the long-run by such a large number of refugees,” she said.

    Nevertheless, the chancellor won a battle with CDU rebels calling for a cap on the number of asylum seekers.

    The compromise text, which passed after four hours of debate with an overwhelming majority, instead called for an unspecified reduction of refugee numbers.

    (SD-Agencies)