Karl Nehammer (ÖVP) and his Swedish colleague Ulf Kristersson emphasized similarities in the asylum issue on Thursday. “Sweden is a strong ally for Austria,” the Chancellor said in Stockholm on Thursday. Both heads of government emphasized that they jointly want to continue to exert pressure on refugee policy within the EU.
Sweden is an important contact point because of the current presidency of the EU Council, said the chancellor, explaining his trip to northern Europe, which will also take him to Denmark on Friday. The asylum issue is a security issue for the whole EU. Therefore, a new understanding of the situation and new solutions are needed. Trustful cooperation is also important to act against people smugglers.
Sweden has learned “important lessons” from the refugee crisis
Kristersson also sees similarities between the two countries when it comes to the asylum situation. The prime minister emphasized that there was a lot of pressure on Austria. The asylum numbers of both countries are comparable, he stressed. Sweden has learned “important lessons” from the 2015 refugee crisis, including internal border controls.
Nehammer hopes to find inspiration for his own politics
Nehammer also hopes the journey north will inspire his own politics. In his chancellor’s speech, he announced that he would develop a model for Austria in which full entitlement to social benefits would be possible only after five years of residence. However, it is still unclear how this project will be developed in concrete terms. In concrete terms, the question is which social benefits should be affected at all. A political stumbling block to the plans is likely to be the ÖVP’s coalition partner, the Greens.
The journey continues to Denmark
This will be the main topic of Friday’s meeting with Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen, a Social Democrat. In Denmark, you must have been legally resident for at least nine of the past ten years in order to claim the full amount of social security benefits. Otherwise there is only half.
But Austria also wants to cooperate more closely with Denmark on migration. The northern EU state had recently campaigned for an expansion of border security at the Union’s external borders, describing the European asylum system as “broken”. Denmark has also been conducting bilateral border controls since 2016.
Source: Krone
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