EU seeks to salvage open borders policy

With Slovenia threatening to become the latest EU country to fence off its borders against refugees, Commission president Jean Claude Juncker will try to prevent the Union’s open borders policy from completely disintegrating at a meeting tomorrow.

He has taken the unusual step of calling together the leaders of 10 countries — a job normally done by EU council president Donald Tusk — to try to return to the Union’s rules on refugees.

Slovenia, with a population of just 2m, has now become the main entry point for refugees trying to reach Austria as neighbouring countries erect fences.

Prime Minister Miro Cerar said they are considering erecting a fence with Croatia but hope tomorrow’s meeting will deliver a European solution, together with €140m to help look after some of the 47,000 refugees that have arrived in the past few days.

The plan is to have all Western Balkan transit countries apply the rules — registering and fingerprinting those at their borders and send back any who do not qualify for asylum.

The countries are EU members Austria, Greece, Hungary, Croatia, Slovenia, Bulgaria and Romania, non-EU countries Serbia and Macedonia while German chancellor Angela Merkel will represent the main destination country.

Mr Juncker is reported to want countries to stop moving refugees to the next country without agreement, and to look after refugees in a humane way.

Despite requests and promises of money to Turkey to reinforce its border with Greece, through which most of the refugees are coming, more than 48,000 crossed in just five days this week.

There is increasing frustration in Brussels with leaders demanding something be done, but refusing to contribute. They agreed last month to distribute 160,000 refugees from Italy and Greece but so far they are taking just 854 in the coming weeks. The European Commission said less than a third of the 800 border guards requested have been promised.

Sweden, which takes the largest number of asylum seekers as a percentage of its population, expects 190,000 applications this year and has taken two groups of Syrians and Eritreans in the last week from Italy.

There have been increasing clashes and violence at borders as frustrated refugees wait, often in the rain, to be allowed through amid growing objections in some countries.

Austria has warned it cannot cope and has introduced controls on its borders, where according to reports around 15,000 refugees were waiting to cross from Slovenia yesterday.

In Germany, Ms Merkel’s policy of taking in up to 800,000 refugees, is evoking a backlash from the far right and in her CDU ruling party.