EU immigration policy was in disarray on Monday night after ministers failed to reach agreement on a relocation scheme for refugees and countries began to introduce border checks within the union’s free travel area.
Following a prolonged meeting of justice minister in Brussels, member states failed to back a refugee relocation plan proposed by the European Commission last week. There was significant opposition from a number of central and east European countries to the idea of mandatory quotas.
Ministers will revisit the issue on October 8th but the development is a blow to European Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker’s proposal to introduce the quotas, a move expected to set an important precedent for EU asylum policy.
Speaking in Brussels on Monday night after the meeting, Minister for Justice Frances Fitzgerald said she was "disappointed" at the failure to reach agreement but she stressed a majority of ministers did back the plan.
“There is a large majority in favour of the figure of 120,000, and the legal instrument was agreed today for the 40,000 [relocation plan], but there are some member states that are not in a position to commit to that figure today,” she said.
‘Urgent and dramatic’
Luxembourg's minister for foreign affairs Jean Asselborn, who chaired the meeting, said the situation facing Europe was "urgent and dramatic" but it was"too early" for a decision to be taken as "procedures have to be respected".
The ministers also considered new proposals to tighten the EU’s external borders, including a plan to detain and potentially tag illegal immigrants in centres in an effort to shore up support from countries opposing relocation measures.
While the justice ministers grappled with the migration crisis in Brussels, the Schengen free-travel zone appeared to be unravelling.
Germany's decision on Sunday to introduce border checks on its borders with Austria has triggered a wave of similar moves by other EU countries - Austria, Slovakia and the Netherlands have all followed suit.
The European Commission denied that the Schengen convention- the free-movement zone that has been a cornerstone of EU policy for two decades - was under threat, pointing out that existing legislation permits countries to introduce temporary border controls in emergency situations.
Germany saidon Monday it now expects to receive 1 million refugees this year, up from a figure of 800,000 cited last week. Berlin has shifted its stance in recent days as its authorities struggle to cope with the numbers crossing its borders.
While German chancellor Angela Merkel took a lead role in welcoming refugees to the European Union by promising refuge to hundreds of thousands of asylum seekers from Syria, vice-chancellor Sigmar Gabriel has said Germany is "reaching its limits" when it comes to migrants. There have been previous instances of countries introducing border checks within the common travel area, but Germany's unexpected move is by far the biggest breach of EU free movement rules in its history.
Speaking from Jordan on Monday, British prime minister David Cameron defended his country's response to the Syrian refugee crisis, as he called on EU member states to increase aid to Syria. "Without British aid, hundreds of thousands more could be risking their lives seeking to get to Europe," he said.
Meanwhile in Hungary, workers erected the final sections of a 4-metre-high steel fence topped with razor wire on the country’s frontier with Serbia, a centre-piece of prime minister Viktor Orban’s response to the migration crisis.
Police, backed by troops, stopped migrants walking into Hungary along a railway line from Serbia on Monday afternoon as the fence was completed.
From midnight to 4pm on Monday, 7,437 migrants entered Hungary from Serbia - beating a single-day record set on Sunday - and most were quickly put on trains and buses to the border with Austria, where they now face security checks.
A spokesman for the UN refugee agency said each country had the right to protect its borders but warned that it was “very important” that people fleeing war and persecution could find protection; most migrants now arriving in Europe are from conflict zones like Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq.
