Germany's new border controls and stronger deportation laws have drawn praise from Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban but prompted criticism from other European states.
“Border protection has become a negative word in recent times, because everyone has had to let the migrants in — whoever stops them is the bad guy,” Orban told Hungarian national radio on Friday.
He quipped that Germany had finally “woken up” and welcomed Scholtz to the club of conservative European leaders.
Screenshot of an X post by Hungarian Prime Minister Victor Orban.
© Photo : PM_ViktorOrban
Germany’s decision was applauded by Dutch MP Geert Wilders, whose anti-immigration Party for Freedom (PVV) won the most seats in the 2023 parliamentary elections in the Netherlands.
“If Germany can do it, why can't we?" Wilders told reporters. "As far as I'm concerned, the sooner the better."
But Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk slammed Germany's decision to impose controls to stop illegal immigration as "unacceptable."
Tusk claimed the measures, set to last for an initial six-month period, were triggered by "the internal German political situation... and not our policy towards illegal migration at our borders," telling a meeting of Polish diplomats he would seek urgent consultations with the countries affected.
Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis slammed Germany's move, noting on Talk Radio that unilaterally "abolishing" the European Union's Schengen area rules on free movement was not the way to resolve the problem.
Austrian Interior Minister Gernard Karner warned that his country would not take in immigrants turned away by Germany.
Under European Union rules temporary controls are allowed "as a last resort measure, in exceptional situations" for up to six months.
Germany shares land borders with Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Poland and Switzerland.
Germany imposed controls along its border with Austria in 2015 to counter a large influx of immigrants, set to expire on November 11 this year.
Similar restrictions are in place along the borders with Poland, the Czech Republic and Switzerland, until December 15. Those controls will now be extended to Germany's land borders with France, Luxembourg, Belgium, the Netherlands and Denmark.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz's ruling coalition has been sinking in the polls. While some of his EU neighbours — like Warsaw — decry the “de facto suspension of the Schengen agreement on a large scale,” his domestic opposition including the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) think his measures do not go far enough.
His center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD) is not only worried about the challenge from right-wing and conservative opposition parties in upcoming regional elections, but also the result of next year’s national election.
Pollsters Forschungsgruppe Wahlen have found that no chancellor since Germays reunification in 1990 enjoyed such a low approval rating as Scholz. 77 percent of those polled said he was a “weak leader.”
There are almost 14 million foreigners in Germany, official data shows. The immigration crisi in Germany dates back to 2015, when thousands of asylum seekers from the Middle East crossed Germany's borders during the war in Syria.
Since the start of NATO's proxy war against Russia, the problem has been exacerbated by the influx of 1.2 million Ukrainians.
Germany has been the primary destination for Ukrainian refugees, offering generous benefits and a monthly stipend.
But with social services strained, Germany began to push for greater "solidarity distribution" of the immigrants among other EU countries earlier this year.