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REFUGEE CRISIS

IMMIGRATION

Migrants leave Salzburg on foot as trains stop

Hundreds of refugees who had massed at the main train station in the city of Salzburg left on foot on Wednesday in the hope of reaching Germany, a city spokesman said.

Migrants leave Salzburg on foot as trains stop
Refugees at Salzburg station. Photo: ORF/Garzuly

One day after Salzburg warned that the station might have to close due to the large numbers of migrants, government spokesman Johannes Greifeneder said the situation had “relaxed”.

“The situation was much more tense this morning. We informed people using flyers written in Arabic that there would be no train service to Germany,” he told AFP.

“We have offered shelter to people but they have refused,” he said. “My guess is that they will try to cross the border on foot.”

The situation escalated this week after Berlin reintroduced border controls at the weekend, temporarily suspending all trains between Austria and Germany.

Although an intermittent service has resumed, it has slowed the passage of thousands from Austria into Germany, causing major road and rail disruption.

Greifeneder said another train from Vienna was to arrive imminently, with another 250 migrants on board.

Late on Tuesday, the state of Salzburg warned that it could close the main train station as a safety measure due to the large numbers of people inside.

Hundreds of migrants were brought to the station on Tuesday afternoon in buses, cars and taxis, mostly from the eastern border with Hungary.

Tens of thousands have entered Austria from Hungary in recent weeks, all but a handful travelling onwards to Germany by train, and mostly to Munich via Salzburg.

But Germany's move to tighten its borders created something of a bottleneck, with around 20,000 migrants stuck in Austria on Monday.

On Tuesday, Austria also tightened checks at the Hungarian border.

Situated in western Austria, Salzburg is a popular tourist destination which is best known abroad for the Sound of Music film and for being Mozart's birthplace.

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.

READ ALSO:

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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