Police on Austria’s eastern border with Hungary are intensifying checks on suspected human traffickers, but otherwise not tightening controls on people crossing the frontier, a spokesman for police in Burgenland province said yesterday.
Austrian Chancellor Werner Faymann had announced on Sunday that Austria planned to phase out emergency measures allowing the unimpeded inflow of thousands of migrants from Hungary to Austria and Germany.
“There will still be no border controls. That would be against the Schengen agreement,” spokesman Helmut Marban said, adding that checks to catch human smugglers “will be activated and become more visible.”
Photo: Reuters
The area was quiet yesterday morning after about 260 migrants crossed over from Hungary before midnight on Sunday.
Austria had suspended its random border checks after photographs of a Syrian toddler lying dead on a Turkish beach showed Europeans the horror faced by those desperate enough to travel illegally into the heart of Europe, which is deeply divided over how to cope.
Faymann said that decision was being revised following “intensive talks” with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and a telephone call with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, bitterly opposed to the waiver.
“We have always said this is an emergency situation in which we must act quickly and humanely. We have helped more than 12,000 people in an acute situation,” Faymann said.
“Now we have to move step by step away from emergency measures toward normality, in conformity with the law and dignity,” he said.
Hungary laid on more than 100 buses to the border on Saturday night after Austria said it had agreed to the emergency measures, to the relief of thousands of migrants and refugees stranded in Budapest after traveling through the Balkans and Greece.
Others set off from a station to make the 170km journey on foot. Platforms filled up again on Sunday.
Germany has said it expects to receive 800,000 refugees and migrants this year, and urged other EU members to open their doors. It decided to free up an additional 3 billion euros (US$3.35 billion) for federal states and municipalities to help cope with the influx, a joint statement by the ruling coalition said.
At the station in Munich, state capital of Bavaria, a few dozen well-wishers turned up to cheer the new arrivals. Those who stopped to speak told of weeks of arduous travel by land and sea. Some seemed intimidated by the welcoming applause.
Upper Bavarian President Christoph Hillenbrand said he expected 13,000 migrants to reach the city on Sunday, up from a previous estimate of 11,000, following 6,800 arrivals on Saturday. Hillenbrand, adding that 11,000 could arrive yesterday, said Munich was running out of capacity.
Authorities there were using a disused car showroom and a railway logistics center as makeshift camps, and were adding a further 1,000 beds to 2,300 already set up at the city’s international trade fair ground. About 4,000 people were sent to other German states.
“It’s getting tight,” Hillenbrand told reporters at the train station.
Merkel’s decision to allow the influx has caused a rift in her conservative bloc, with her Bavarian allies saying she had pushed ahead without consulting the federal state administrations dealing with the problem on the ground.
The political rift is greater across Europe, with Orban accusing Berlin of encouraging the influx.
“As long as Austria and Germany don’t say clearly that they won’t take in any more migrants, several million new immigrants will come to Europe,” Orban told Austrian broadcaster ORF.
Orban has portrayed the crisis as a defense of Europe’s prosperity, identity and “Christian values” against a tide of mainly Muslim migrants.
The US has come under pressure to do more to help.
David Miliband, head of the International Rescue Committee and a former British foreign secretary, called on Washington to bring out “the kind of leadership America has shown on these kind of issues” in the past.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rejected a call by opposition leader Isaac Herzog to take in Syrian refugees, saying the nation was too small to take them in.
Gulf states Kuwait, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates have also come under criticism for officially taking in zero refugees.
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