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IMMIGRATION

Austria rejects calls for German border controls

The Austrian interior ministry has rejected calls for the reintroduction of border controls with Germany, following claims from the German state of Bavaria that large numbers of refugees are crossing the border.

Austria rejects calls for German border controls
Austria's border with Bavaria. Photo: Mike Gnell/Gadding.com

On Sunday, Bavaria’s interior minister Joachim Herrmann demanded more police checks on the Austrian border. “Given the huge problems on Bavaria’s border with Austria, the federal police must be significantly strengthened,” Herrmann said.

An Austrian police source told the Kronen Zeitung that Bavaria would only be “harming itself if it tries to reintroduce pre-Schengen border controls”.

Countries belonging to the Schengen area allow passport-free movement across their borders, making it easier to travel. Members of the Schengen agreement may reinstate border controls for a short period, if this is necessary for “public policy or national security” reasons.

Meanwhile, German Chancellor Angela Merkel has called for a common EU asylum policy to help deal with the current influx of refugees.

Speaking on ZDF public television, Merkel said the Dublin agreement, which accords responsibility for processing asylum seekers to the EU country in which they first arrive, was not working.

She said the EU also needed agreement on which countries asylum seekers could be returned to if their applications were rejected.

Some German officials have said the number of asylum-seekers could top 600,000 this year, and thousands of refugees are sleeping in tents. 

FAR-RIGHT

Germany issues entry ban to Austrian far-right activist Sellner

Radical Austrian nationalist Martin Sellner has been banned from entering Germany, it emerged on Tuesday, days after he was deported from Switzerland.

Germany issues entry ban to Austrian far-right activist Sellner

Sellner, a leader of Austria’s white pride Identitarian Movement, posted a video of himself on X, formerly Twitter, reading out a letter he said was from the city of Potsdam.

A spokeswoman for the city authorities confirmed to AFP that an EU citizen had been served with a “ban on their freedom of movement in Germany”.

The person can no longer enter or stay in Germany “with immediate effect” and could be stopped by police or deported if they try to enter the country, the spokeswoman said, declining to name the individual for privacy reasons.

READ ALSO: Who is Austria’s far-right figurehead banned across Europe?

“We have to show that the state is not powerless and will use its legitimate means,” Mike Schubert, the mayor of Potsdam, said in a statement.

Sellner caused an uproar in Germany after allegedly discussing the Identitarian concept of “remigration” with members of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) at a meeting in Potsdam in November.

Reports of the meeting sparked a huge wave of protests against the AfD, with tens of thousands of Germans attending demonstrations across the country.

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Swiss police said Sunday they had prevented a hundred-strong far-right gathering due to be addressed by Sellner, adding that he had been arrested and deported.

The Saturday meeting had been organised by the far-right Junge Tat group, known for its anti-immigration and anti-Islamic views.

The group is also a proponent of the far-right white nationalist Great Replacement conspiracy theory espoused by Sellner’s Identitarian Movement.

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