EU data: Turks largest foreign community in Europe in 2009

Turkish citizens were the largest group of non-European Union citizens living in the EU at the start of 2009, the EU statistics office said Tuesday. In total, 31.9 million foreigners were recorded in the 27-member bloc at the beginning of 2009, or 6.4 percent of the total EU population, said Eurostat. The largest contingent of foreigners chose Germany as home — 7.2 million people — followed by Spain with 5.7 million. But the country with the highest percentage of foreigners was tiny Luxembourg with 44 percent, followed by Latvia (18 percent), and Greek Cyprus and Estonia (16 percent). Of the total number of foreigners, 11.9 million (2.4 percent) were citizens of another EU state, and 19.9 million (4 percent) came from countries outside the EU — Africa (4.9 million), Asia (4 million), and the American continent (3.3 million). Citizens of Turkey were the largest group of non-EU citizens with 2.4 million or 8 percent, followed by Morocco (1.8 million, 6 percent) and Albania (1 million, 3 percent).