German federal police registered just 808 new arrivals in the five days from Friday, March 18 to Wednesday 23, according to figures leaked to Bild newspaper.

That was an average of 135 migrants a day, a far cry from the 1.1m who entered Germany last year - an average of just over 3,000 per day.

Overall police have registered 109,000 new arrivals so far this year.

As recently as mid-February more than 2,000 asylum-seekers were crossing Germany’s borders each day.

Mrs Merkel has spoken out against moves by Austria, Macedonia and other countries to close their borders to asylum-seekers, warning it risks causing a new crisis in Greece.

But Germany has been a beneficiary of the border closures, which have prevented migrants travelling across Europe.