By IRNA
Berlin : Foreigners are still being discriminated in the European Union and Germany amid stepped up efforts to promote integration, according to two separate studies, unveiled here Wednesday by the former head of the German Parliament Rita Suessmuth.
“There is continuous disadvantage of ethnic minorities within the EU, said Suessmuth who headed an EU expert group.
Many migrant groups in Germany face also inequality on the labor market and in society, the study added.
A government report released last December painted a ‘dramatic’ picture about the situation of 15 million people with a migrant background.
Presenting the latest 260-page study, the integration commissioner of the German government Maria Boehmer said the findings were ‘anything but satisfactory’.
She urged greater efforts for ‘improved integration’ in Germany.
According to the report, some 17.5 percent of migrant children drop out of school.
Meanwhile, only 23 percent of migrant youths complete job training programs, compared to 57 percent of German teenagers.
Some 40 percent of migrants do not finish their vocational training.
The highest percentage of migrants without a vocational qualification are Turks with 72 percent, followed by Greeks with 61 and Italians with 56 percent.
People of migrant background are twice as highly to face the risk of unemployment than Germans.
“This devil’s circle of little education, lack of vocational training and high joblessness has to be overcome,” Boehmer said.
“We have to name the problems in order to be able to solve them,” she added.
The seventh government report on the situation of foreigners is being presented every two years.