{"id":217531,"date":"2025-06-27T03:08:10","date_gmt":"2025-06-27T03:08:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/217531\/"},"modified":"2025-06-27T03:08:10","modified_gmt":"2025-06-27T03:08:10","slug":"austrian-chancellor-sees-anti-immigration-ally-in-merz-politico","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/217531\/","title":{"rendered":"Austrian chancellor sees anti-immigration ally in Merz \u2013 POLITICO"},"content":{"rendered":"

Stocker said he viewed Austria as \u201ca pioneer\u201d in promoting stricter European policies on asylum claims. Germany has long pushed back on some of the tougher European migration proposals, but Merz\u2019s arrival has shifted that paradigm.<\/p>\n

Under pressure from the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) opposition party, Merz\u2019s conservative-led government has vowed to drastically cut the inflow of asylum seekers to the country. Just days after taking office this spring Merz\u2019s interior minister increased checks on Germany\u2019s borders \u2014 including with Austria \u2014 and said German police would turn away more undocumented immigrants, including asylum seekers.<\/p>\n

The border crackdown led to tensions<\/a> between Germany and its neighbors, with politicians in France, Poland and Austria criticizing Merz\u2019s government for inhibiting the free movement of people and goods within the Schengen area. Ultimately, the number of asylum seekers turned away at Germany\u2019s borders was low, leading critics to disparage Merz\u2019s crackdown<\/a> as largely symbolic.<\/p>\n

Stocker downplayed the suggestion that Germany\u2019s border controls had created significant tensions between the two countries, instead siding with Merz to form a tough-on-migration axis within Europe.<\/p>\n

\u201cI believe that these restrictions do not have a major impact,\u201d he said of the border controls. \u201cIf there is a need to control an internal border, and we have done so ourselves \u2026 I cannot deny other countries doing the same. In other words, these border controls are ultimately a solution that is not intended to be permanent, but sometimes it is a necessary one.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"Germany has long pushed back on some of the tougher European migration proposals, but Friedrich Merz\u2019s arrival has shifted that paradigm. | Oliver Matthys\/EPA<\/p>\n

Prior to the European Council summit\u00a0in Brussels on Thursday,<\/a> Merz attended a gathering of anti-immigration European leaders that included Italy\u2019s Giorgia Meloni and Denmark\u2019s Mette Frederiksen. \u201cWe are back on board with the topic of migration,\u201d an official from the German chancellery said.<\/p>\n

Stocker, whose centrist coalition is also under pressure from the far right<\/a>, said he favors the Commission\u2019s plan to overhaul the EU\u2019s deportation system<\/a>, called for heightened controls on the bloc\u2019s external borders, and urged that asylum procedures take place on Europe\u2019s borders instead of within member states.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a matter of coordinating our positions, while also coordinating how we deal with the issues discussed in the European Council at the European level,\u201d Stocker said ahead of his Friday meeting with Merz.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Stocker said he viewed Austria as \u201ca pioneer\u201d in promoting stricter European policies on asylum claims. Germany has…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":217532,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5310],"tags":[5108,7907,768,365,2000,85516,299,1105,1945,1824,2440,40,2199,48802,6657,45,46,48,34589],"class_list":{"0":"post-217531","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-germany","8":"tag-asylum","9":"tag-austria","10":"tag-borders","11":"tag-denmark","12":"tag-eu","13":"tag-eu-summit","14":"tag-europe","15":"tag-far-right","16":"tag-friedrich-merz","17":"tag-germany","18":"tag-giorgia-meloni","19":"tag-immigration","20":"tag-italy","21":"tag-mette-frederiksen","22":"tag-migration","23":"tag-playbook","24":"tag-policy","25":"tag-rights","26":"tag-schengen-area"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114753130570375662","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/217531","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=217531"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/217531\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/217532"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=217531"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=217531"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=217531"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}