Tension between Europe’s governments on Saturday continued to hamper progress on a common response to the refugee crisis as thousands of exhausted migrants reached the Austrian border.
At a meeting of EU foreign ministers in Luxembourg, eastern European nations reiterated calls for the union to prioritise shoring up its external borders. They warned that talking up common asylum policies without securing the frontiers would only serve to spur more people to make the journey.
While Austria has suspended EU rules to grant entry to the migrants, Hungary has confirmed its intention to criminalise illegal border crossings in an attempt to stem the inflow of Syrian, Afghan and Eritrean refugees.