Germany, France want European Commission to extend border controls

Germany will ask the European Commission to allow an extension of temporary border controls within the Schengen zone to stem the flow of refugees across Europe, Interior Minister Thomas De Maiziere said on Saturday.

Germany and some other European Union members have introduced temporary border checks to control or halt record flows of refugees and asylum-seekers fleeing conflicts in Syria, Iraq and elsewhere and traveling to western Europe via the Balkans.

The EU Schengen’s zone allows passport free travel across the bloc’s borders, but some countries were given permission to temporarily reinstate border checks, which is due to run out on May 12. A German government official said the request for a six-month extension would be send to Brussels on Monday in a joint letter from Germany, France, Austria, Belgium, Denmark and Sweden.

Germany took in more than a million refugees last year, but the numbers of arrivals has slowed significantly recently after border clampdowns were imposed by Austria and other countries along the migrants’ main Balkans route northwards from Greece.

“Even if the refugee situation has eased at internal borders along the West Balkan route, we look with concern at the developments on the external borders of the Union,” De Maiziere said in a statement.

Berlin will therefore ask the European Commission, the EU's executive arm, to allow the border controls to be extended beyond May 12 when the legal basis for the current measures expires, he said.

“Member states must continue to have the flexibility and option to conduct border controls at their internal borders in cases when it is necessary,” De Maiziere said, adding such measures were required to guarantee a certain level of safety.

A European Commission source told Reuters that Brussels was leaning towards giving its green light to the request and to allow an extension of the border checks until November.

The numbers of migrant arrivals to Germany has dropped to less than 200 daily in recent weeks from more than 2,000 daily in January. At the height of the refugee crisis last autumn, more than 10,000 migrants arrived in Germany on some days.

In her weekly podcast, German Chancellor Angela Merkel urged EU member states to avoid seeking national solutions to European problems, adding that she would fight to uphold EU citizens' right to freedom of movement and residence within the bloc.

Merkel has been critical of border closures within the EU and is instead banking on an EU-Turkey deal that took effect early April and gives Ankara political and financial benefits in return for taking back refugees and migrants who have crossed to Greece en route for Germany and other west European states.