Merkel: 'Mocked', but Germany won't reverse liberal refugee policy

Chancellor Angela Merkel has said Germany will continue to welcome in refugees after critics linked a series of attacks in the country to immigration.

Merkel told reporters that the assailants "wanted to undermine our sense of community, our openness and our willingness to help people in need. We firmly reject this", she said.

She described four brutal attacks in a week as "shocking, oppressive and depressing" but not a sign that authorities had lost control.

"Taboos of civilisation are being broken," she said, referring to a series of deadly attacks in France, Belgium, Turkey and the US state of Florida as well as Germany.

"These acts happened in places where any of us could have been."

She once again called for borders to be opened to people fleeing war and persecution, many from Syria. Germany has welcomed in nearly 1.1 million migrants and refugees to the country in 2015.

"I am still convinced today that 'we can do it' - it is our historic duty and this is a historic challenge in times of globalisation," she said.

"We have already achieved very, very much in the last 11 months."

Merkel was speaking after a axe rampage, a shooting spree, a knife attack and a suicide bombing stunned the country, leaving 13 dead, including three assailants, and dozens wounded.

Three of the four attackers were asylum seekers, and two of the assaults were claimed by the Islamic State group.