“Ms Mikl-Leitner, who was speaking to reporters at the Spielfeld border crossing with Slovenia, offered no details or time frame for the new measures”.
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It is likely to run into domestic and global criticism for the signal it sends to other nations struggling to cope with tens of thousands of desperate people moving though their nations.
The small Alpine nation of Slovenia, which has been swamped by migrants recently, also reiterated its readiness to erect a fence along its Croatian frontier if new European Union plans aimed at improving the situation failed to produce quick results.
Austria is to build a fence along its border with Slovenia to slow the flood of refugees heading to northern Europe, it was announced Wednesday.
In fact, Austria has already invoked the principle of free movement within the European Union and has been strongly opposing fencing off the borders. European Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker is due to speak by phone to Austrian chancellor Werner Faymann on Wednesday.
“We have taken the decision, as a country, to take 20,000 refugees”, he said in parliament.
Although Mikl-Leitner did not state when construction would begin, it is understood that technical work would start immediately and should take about 10 days.
Austria has said that it is planning to build a fence along its border along with Slovenia in order to control the flow of asylum seekers.
About 260,000 have passed through Croatia since mid-September when Hungary put up a fence on the border with Serbia, diverting the flow.
The two sides have discussed the problem, he said, adding that “Austria yesterday pledged to return to an orderly process”. A few 47,500 people have arrived in Slovenia since October 17, according to the Slovenian government, the vast majority of whom intend to travel on to Austria and Germany.
Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere says “Austria’s behavior in recent days was out of line”.
But as the southern German province of Bavaria, which borders Austria, has complained increasingly stridently to Berlin that it is reaching the limits of its capacity to receive refugees, concern in Austria has risen that Germany could further restrict arrivals, creating a backlog.
Merkel will lead a business delegation to China during the two-day visit, a spokesman for the German embassy said.
Until recently it was widely accepted that Afghans, Iraqis and above all Syrians had a right to apply for asylum in Germany.
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On Afghanistan, de Maiziere argued that Germany and other western nations have poured development aid into the country as well as sending troops and police to help train security forces there. “The two countries have maintained close cooperation in worldwide affairs and are both actively committed to addressing focus issues through political and diplomatic means”, the ambassador said.
