VIENNA, Sept. 14 (UPI) — Austria is deploying troops and imposing border controls amid the migrant crisis as the European Union is scheduled to discuss the issue on Monday.
Austrian officials said up to 7,000 migrants entered Monday and 14,000 entered Sunday from Hungary. Germany announced it was imposing border controls with Austria on Sunday, which prompted Austrian authorities to react.
“If Germany carries out border controls, Austria must put strengthened border controls in place,” Austrian Vice-Chancellor Reinhold Mitterlehner said, BBC News reported. “We are doing that now.”
The Austrian troops will be deployed primarily to provide humanitarian assistance, but will be sent to the border with Hungary if needed, Austrian Chancellor Werner Faymann said.
Hungary said 5,809 migrants entered and were detained Sunday. Hungarian police will begin arresting undocumented immigrants on Tuesday, when a 13-foot fence is set to be completed on Hungary’s border with Serbia.
EU members will meet to discuss the proposal to accommodate 160,000 asylum seekers throughout 23 EU countries through quotas. Most migrants are fleeing war-torn Syria, but many others are from Afghanistan and Eritrea.
The EU rule on refugees, known as the Dublin Regulation, says asylum seekers must register in the first EU member country in which they arrive. Many migrants are refusing to register in Greece and Hungary due to fear that they will be prevented from traveling to Germany or other EU countries.
Germany imposed border controls by setting up roadblocks at the Austrian border. At least 25 suspected human traffickers have already been arrested but no migrants are reportedly being sent away.
German Vice-Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel said border controls were “absolutely not a suspension of the basic rights to asylum,” but rather about sending a message that Germany “cannot accommodate all of the refugees alone.”
