Swedish officers check IDs on a train arriving from Denmark.
Advertisement
“We want it clarified whether the statement of the German minister is the official position of Germany“.
When Viktor Orban became Hungary’s Prime Minister for the second time in May 2010, his xenophobic, authoritarian politics left him isolated in Europe. According to him, the goal of raising the fence is to avoid unorganized and uncontrolled influx of migrants.
On Thursday, the authorities arrested 17 individuals accused of human trafficking, who are believed to have moved about 1,800 undocumented immigrants from Serbia to Austria in seven months.
Interior Minister Johanna Mikl-Leitner said the fence will be 2.2 metres high.
She said Thursday that those in custody include the suspected head of the ring. Those still at large are being sought under global arrest warrants.
His Fidesz party has seen its polling rating rise by four per cent since the installation of the razor-wire fence, solidifying its core vote and attracting around 300,000 swing voters.
The convention prescribes that asylum seekers should have their claims processed in the first country in which they arrive in the EU.
Over 391,000 people have entered Hungary this year, though the number has fallen to around a dozen a day since the government also closed its border with Croatia to migrants in mid-October.
“The G20 must rise to the challenge and lead a coordinated and innovative response to the crisis that recognizes its global nature and economic consequences, and promotes greater worldwide solidarity in protecting refugees”, an European Union statement said. The decision is impacting one of the last land roads still available to refugees seeking to start a new life in Western Europe. “No European country will allow such a situation”.
Further east, Bulgaria was the first in the region to fence off its border with Turkey.
“The temporary reintroduction of border controls between member states is an exceptional possibility explicitly foreseen in and regulated by the Schengen Borders Code, in case of a serious threat to public policy or internal security”, the European Commission said in a statement. “We must hurry, but without panic”.
The travel zone involves 30 countries, a few of which are not in the EU.
The Alpine republic’s general director of public security, Konrad Kogler, told reporters that a 3.7-km fence would be built either side of the Spielfeld crossing in the coming weeks.
The aim is to reach agreement with the European Union on economic reform, cutting red tape and other changes by the end of this year.
Police said the 21-year-old woman was on her way back to a home for asylum-seekers in the town of Bad Belzig, about 100 kilometers (60 miles) southwest of Berlin, on Wednesday afternoon when she was attacked by two boys, aged 14 and 15, and a 14-year-old girl, the dpa news agency reported.
Refugees awaiting passage into Austria at the Šentilj border crossing. About 200 officers will be specially trained to work as border police.
Earlier this week, Sweden also reinstated temporary checks, while Slovenia rolled out razor wire along its frontier with non-Schengen member Croatia. “Those barriers in the form of a fence will be used only to direct the uncontrolled flow of refugees”, Cerar added.
Advertisement
The two states have long argued over the border at this spot on the Sutla, where the Croatian village of Harmica sits facing similarly-sized Rigonce in Slovenia. “We reacted the same way and Hungary removed the wire”, she said.
