Conservative Interior Minister Horst Seehofer, presenting the proposed immigration law, described it as a "historic point of juncture" offering clear criteria for who should be able to come to Germany to work and under what conditions.

Axar.az reports citing Reuters.

Angela Merkel's government on Thursday presented a long-awaited bill to the Bundestag which would alter regulations pertaining to the immigration of skilled workers, sparking heated debate and prompting criticism from various political flanks.

Initially agreed upon by Angela Merkel's Cabinet five months ago, the reworked law is the government's response to years of vocal complaints from the business community about the lack of qualified IT specialists and engineers, health care workers, and other vocational professions in Germany.

For example, the German IT company Biktom announced that there were 82,000 vacancies in the nation's IT sector.

The suspension of a mandatory check, which normally accompanies all job applications from outside the EU, that ensures there are no German or EU citizen applicants who have priority is one key aspect of the proposed law, which is also set to ease the procedure for immigrants with vocational qualifications hoping to move to Germany.

Previously, those with academic qualifications were given preference.

The proposed law will also allow some people to come to Germany for the purpose of receiving vocational training.

Another migration law proposed by the government modifies how asylum-seekers whose applications have been rejected can obtain a "tolerated" status, thus allowing them to remain in Germany.

This applies to rejected asylum-seekers who have embarked upon a state vocational training course, have mastered the German language, work at least 20 hours a week and have displayed an ability to support themselves for at least 18 months.