Austria deploys army as part of tougher border controls

Gabriel, who is also economy minister, urged Europe to examine how it can “quickly help in an efficient way the countries of origins of these refugees”.

Austria said on Monday it will deploy about 2,200 troops to help deal with a massive migrant influx across its border with Hungary.

It also ceased all train services from Austria, which is the mode of transportation most migrants use to enter the country.

France’s Bernard Cazeneuve noted that he had already last month set up new checks close to the Italian border and could follow Germany’s lead in suspending Europe’s Schengen open-frontier rules if necessary.

A father and his daughter cross the borderline on their way to a temporary holding center for migrants in the early morning at the border between Serbia and Hungary in Roszke, southern Hungary, Monday, September 14, 2015.

The images of hundreds of German police mobilising at the border piled on the pressure in advance of the European Union meeting of interior and justice ministers on the plan to introduce compulsory quotas for admitting refugees.

“The temporary reintroduction of border controls between Member States is an exceptional possibility explicitly foreseen in and regulated by the Schengen Borders Code, in case of a crisis situation”, said a Commission statement.

“We have been walking through Europe for 22 days”, said 27-year-old Hatem Ali Ahaj, who suffers from asthma and was struggling to catch his breath. “The goal of this measure is to restrict the present inflow of migrants into Germany and return again to an orderly process upon entry”.

Those seeking asylum have to understand “they can not chose the states where they are seeking protection”, he added.

European Union members were on a collision course on Monday over proposals to distribute asylum-seekers across the continent, a plan backed by safe-haven Germany but resisted by several ex-Communist states in the east.

The focus will initially lie on the border with Austria, de Maiziere said.

The Schengen Agreement, which guarantees passport-free movement within much of continental Europe, has served as a cornerstone of European unity, along with the euro and a single market.

That figure crept higher Sunday, when at least 28 people drowned off Greece after their boat capsized. Greece is simply overwhelmed by the numbers of people coming across the sea from Turkey and can not properly screen the migrants, let alone lodge them.

Hungary, which is building a fence along its border and says it will arrest illegal migrants from this week, wants much stricter controls around the edges of the EU.