Fear of Middle Eastern terrorists among migrants brings back border checks
While Bulgaria is doing its best to convince Austria and the Netherlands to let us into Schengen, a wave of discontent is rising against the EU’s free movement zone.
Western media reported that 11 nations in the Schengen area – from France to Slovakia and from Sweden to Germany – have reinstated long-abandoned border restrictions, including passport checks, police interviews, static checkpoints and vehicle checks.
According to an EU report, many countries believe that border checks are essential to prevent the infiltration of terrorists from the Middle East posing as migrants. Governments also say the measures are necessary because of growing tensions in overcrowded asylum reception centres.
Italy, for example, stepped up border checks this month with neighboring Slovenia, blaming the war between Israel and Hamas for an “increased threat of violence within the EU” amid “constant migration pressures by land and sea”. Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni even predicted that the whole
Schengen
project can
to be broken
in the frantic attempt to protect the safety of Europe.
Slovenia has in turn announced checks on its borders with Hungary and Croatia, saying it faces the same problems as Italy, as well as “threats to public order and internal security”.
Denmark, which now strictly monitors its land and sea borders with Germany, says it faces a “significant threat” to internal security from terrorists, organized crime and illegal migration. Copenhagen has announced that it may soon extend checks to air travelers arriving from elsewhere in the EU.
Sweden warns it is checking all its EU borders because of terrorism and the serious threat to national security it poses. Croatian Prime Minister Andrej Plenković welcomed tighter pan-European borders: “The EU is surrounded by a series of very big crises… bigger than ever in the last 30 years. We have Putin’s aggression against Ukraine, Hamas’s attack on Israel, all this in the context of increased flows of illegal migration”.
Plenkovic believes that the inspections are a signal from politicians that nations care about their people. He also called for the EU’s external borders to be more tightly secured, a message echoed by German Chancellor Olaf Scholz.
Hungary, meanwhile, blames the tight borders on the EU’s failure to curb mass illegal immigration into the bloc, a policy it says threatens the security of individual countries.
Tightening the borders is contrary to the Schengen agreement. Introduced nearly 30 years ago, its purpose is precisely to allow the free movement of passengers between member states – without checks, passports and delays.
In the words of Brussels bureaucrats, Schengen is
the pearl in
the crown of
the European one
integration
But critics have long pointed out that the policy is a lure for migrants and terrorists. Last year, over 300,000 refugees and illegal migrants successfully entered the EU through its external borders and – under Schengen rules – could move freely throughout Europe.
Great Britain took the first independent measures to deport refugees. Germany and Italy are about to follow suit. The tendency to make important decisions not as part of a union, but at the national level, is being confirmed. And this dooms the zone of limitless travel to decline and leads to its eventual disintegration, writes in “Daily Mail”.
“Taking the train from Austria to Germany feels like Schengen never existed. When crossing the border, the journey stops. All doors… are closed. Well-equipped police officers walk the train to begin identity checks. The immediate impact: a delay in every journey” – noted a recent report by “Euroactive”.
2023-11-13 23:00:00
#Tres #Schengen #countries #rebel #free #movement
