The European Union Is Disintegrating: Austria Builds New Fence; Germany, Sweden Resume Border Checks
It was just two days ago when we reported that Slovenia had begun to construct its own version of Viktor Orban’s now infamous razor wire, anti-migrant fences. As The New York times noted, more than 170,000 refugees from the war-torn Mid-East have crossed into Slovenia from Croatia in the last month alone. To get an idea of just how dramatic that is, relatively speaking, consider that Slovenia is a nation of just two million.
Slovenian prime minister, Miro Cerar, is concerned that with winter right around the corner, his country will not have the resources to house the migrants even if it wanted to, setting up the possibility that a severe humanitarian crisis could unfold. In short, Slovenia was able to cope with the flows from Croatia as long as a roughly equal number of migrants were exiting to Austria, but if anything slowed the migrants’ progress into Austria and Germany (like border controls for instance), then tiny Slovenia would be in a tough spot.
And so, Slovenia built a razor wire fence on its border with Croatia. Croatia dubbed the project “a waste of time.”
Now, as Reuters reports, “The European Commission has formally authorized the temporary reimposition of border controls by Sweden and Germany’s extension of frontier checks.” Here’s more:
Sweden, long a haven for people fleeing war and persecution, was the latest EU state to re-establish checks at its borders to stem a tide of migrants coming from Denmark.
Germany reimposed border controls on Sept. 13 and decided to extend them beyond an initial limit of two months foreseen by Schengen rules, using a clause that permits stretching checks to a maximum of six months.
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