Interior Minister Karner opposes any relief for the Mediterranean countries and also rejects financial compensation.
Vienna / Luxembourg. Austria is not one of those countries that will in future take part in the voluntary admission of people seeking protection from other EU countries: that has been clear since the EU interior ministers’ meeting last Friday, at which an agreement was reached on the distribution mechanism, which has been controversial for years. Interior Minister Gerhard Karner (ÖVP) has emphasized that Austria will neither accept refugees nor provide financial aid for particularly affected countries on the EU’s external borders – including Greece, Italy, Spain, Cyprus and Malta.
“A redistribution of migrants in Europe sends the smugglers the wrong signal,” said Karner. Vienna thus joins the group of EU governments whose restrictive refugee policy makes a general quota system in the Union impossible.