Sweden and Denmark Add Border Checks to Stem Flow of Migrants

All travellers wanting to cross the Oresund bridge by train or bus, or use ferry services, will be refused entry Sweden introduces border controls without the necessary documents.

The moves by the two Scandinavian countries represented another step in the erosion of the ideal of borderless travel across most of the European Union, amid rising concerns about the costs imposed by the tide of migration and fears that terrorists are seeking to enter Europe masquerading as refugees. The number of migrants arriving in southern Sweden from Denmark dropped sharply on the first day that Sweden imposed systematic ID checks on travellers, police said today.

Schleswig-Holstein governor Torsten Albig said Monday that “the checks could encroach on our good cohabitation in the German-Danish border region and in particular burden commuters”.

The Swedish government made a decision to tighten border controls after 160,000 people applied for asylum in Sweden previous year – the highest number in Europe except for Germany.

More than one million migrants fleeing conflicts and poverty in the Middle East and beyond sought shelter in Europe in 2015 and many more are expected to come during 2016.

Sweden’s SJ train company said it would not have time to check people travelling between Copenhagen and Malmo over the Oresund bridge.

Temporary fencing has also been erected at Kastrup station to prevent people from trying to sneak onto Sweden-bound trains. At the height of the migrant crisis a few months ago, more than 1,000 asylum-seekers crossed the bridge daily.

“We’re turning back the clock”, said Andreas Onnerfors, an associate professor in intellectual history who lives in Lund and has studied on both sides and taught students from both Sweden and Denmark.

Danish Prime Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen cited the Swedish checks to justify his own country’s immediate introduction of random border controls.

In response, Denmark beefed up its border controls with Germany as of noon Monday (midnight, NZ time).

Officials in Germany, which itself is struggling to absorb about a million migrants who arrived during 2015, said they were paying close attention to the new Danish border checks and their possible impact on the northward flow of migrants into Denmark. “The solution won’t be found at national borders between country A and country B”.

In contrast, Denmark expects to receive about 20,000 asylum seekers this year.

Martin Schaefer, a Foreign Ministry spokesman, said freedom of movement within the European Union was “perhaps one of the greatest achievements in the last 60 years”. “This is not a happy moment at all”, he declared, adding that the border control at the Danish-German border will be unsystematic and so far be for ten days, but with the possibility of an extention.

Joakim Ruist, a macroeconomist and migration researcher at the University of Gothenburg’s School of Business, said Europe would eventually have to forge a new refugee policy.

The latest news on the influx of asylum seekers and other migrants into Europe.