Austrian Chancellor Werner Faymann and European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker agreed Wednesday that “fences have no place in Europe,” a day after Vienna said it planned to seal off its border with Slovenia to stem the flow of migrants.
The two men spoke on the phone hours after the Austrian interior minister said a fence on the border with Slovenia was the best way to ensure “orderly, controlled entry” into Austria.
Faymann reiterated his opposition to sealing off the border in an interview with Austrian broadcaster ORF, saying that “there is no fence with Hungary nor with Slovenia … Fences do not solve the problem. Anyone who makes such [a] claim is throwing dust in the eyes of people.”
The difference of opinion between Faymann and Interior Minister Johanna Mikl-Leitner reveals a split in the governing coalition over how to deal with migration: The chancellor is leader of the Social Democrats (SPÖ) while Mikl-Leitner comes from the center-right Austrian People’s Party (ÖVP).
Mikl-Leitner did not use the word fence when she visited the border at Spielfeld on Tuesday, but a day later she told radio station Ö1, “This is about ensuring an orderly, controlled entry into our country, not about shutting down the border.”
“A fence also has a door,” she added.
Before his call with Juncker, Faymann had refused to be drawn on a border fence, speaking only about “technical safety measures” to deal with the crisis and admitting that he had not received a proposal for a fence from the interior ministry.
Faymann may be opposed to a fence, but not all members of the Social Democrats seem to feel the same way. Defense Minister Gerald Klug said he could imagine barriers “to be able to control the migrants in an orderly manner.”
Thousands of refugees arrive daily at the border with Slovenia. Around 6,000 refugees were in Spielfeld on Wednesday.
“Austria is destroying the Schengen area from within,” Guy Verhofstadt, the leader of the liberal ALDE group in the European Parliament, said about Mikl-Leitner’s plans for a fence.
“Instead of building fences, the Austrians should help the Slovenians to protect their border as decided last Sunday during the summit on the Western Balkan route. Or use the bricks of their so-called fence to build schools in the refugee camps!”
Slovenia has struggled to cope since Hungary closed its border with Croatia, which led Zagreb to send migrants to Slovenia instead. However, the Slovenian government maintained that it would keep giving free passage to migrants heading to Austria and Germany. That stance appears to be changing: Asked last week if he would consider building a fence, Miro Cerar, the prime minister, told reporters, “We are also considering those options.”
The fence row started one day after Austria was criticized by a senior figure in neighboring Germany. “Austria’s behavior has strained neighborly relations. We cannot and must not treat each other this way,” said Horst Seehofer, leader of Bavaria’s main party, the Christian Social Union, the sister party of Angela Merkel’s Christian Democrats.