Schengen Showdown
Austria is in dispute with its European colleagues over expanding the Schengen Area and a common migration policy in need of reform
Servus!
Austria is heading towards a showdown with its European partners over a possible enlargement of the Schengen common travel area, within which passport and other types of border control have been more-or-less abolished. As part of their accession to the European Union, Croatia, Romania, and Bulgaria are candidates for Schengen membership pursuant to having met certain criteria. EU member states are due to discuss admitting these countries to the Schengen club at a summit in Brussels tomorrow. While the Austrian government is now on board with Croatian membership, it remains a holdout on Romania and Bulgaria.
The point of contention for the Austrian government—and specifically the conservative People’s Party (ÖVP), which controls the interior ministry and Europe portfolio—is migration. Schengen’s present outer borders aren’t being adequately protected right now, interior minister Gerhard Karner has argued in the lead-up to the summit, and moving that frontier several hundred miles eastward to the border between Bulgaria and Turkey would only make things worse. Europe minister Karoline Edtstadler has said that the rate of migration into Europe is already too high, and at an EU-Western Balkans summit in Tirana on Tuesday, chancellor Karl Nehammer sought assurances from Brussels that something would be done to bring migration into western Europe via the Balkan and Bulgaria-Romania-Hungary routes under control.
In this instance, this ‘wave of migration’ is no fiction of the ÖVP’s imagination—from an Austrian perspective, at least. Between January and October of this year, Austria received close to 90,000 asylum applications1, which is more than were submitted in the entirety of 2015, the year of the refugee crisis. While Afghans and Syrians continue to constitute the two largest national groups of asylum seekers, the new upward trend is in potential refugees coming from India, Tunisia, and Pakistan. Whatever the reasons for their displacement, be they environmental or economic, the fact is Indians and Tunisians have practically no chance of gaining asylum in Austria.
The current European migration and asylum system is broken. That economic migrants are attempting to find a way into Europe via the asylum system is because it is incredibly hard for third-country nationals to gain legal residency in EU countries2. And that these migrants are attempting to claim asylum in Austria is because of inherent inequalities within the EU when it comes to taking applications. In order for asylum seekers to reach Austria on foot, they must first traverse Hungary. Austria is a more attractive destination than Hungary: more work, higher pay, less hostile. But the Orbán regime has also made it nigh-on impossible for refugees and other migrants to lodge asylum claims there, hence the absurd imbalance of 90,000 asylum applications in Austria this year versus next to none just over the border.
Notwithstanding the foregoing, the question is whether this European grandstanding has less to do with forging a common European migration policy and more to do with the underlying political conditions in Austria. The far-right Freedom Party (FPÖ) is in the ascendence at the expense of the ÖVP, which has slipped into third place in the polls behind the FPÖ. Aside from inflation and the cost of living, one of the issues the far-right has been able to capitalize on has been migration. To some extent, the ÖVP is using Europe as a piñata, hoping their reward is a surer electoral footing back home.
Bis bald!
Thank you for subscribing to the Vienna Briefing. If you know someone who might also be interested in receiving this newsletter, consider sharing it with them today.
The Vienna Briefing is a free newsletter. If you enjoy and would like to support my work, think about sending me a tip via PayPal. Thank you to all those who have made donations.
Benefit Muddle
Austria’s governing parties have failed to come to terms over possible unemployment benefit reforms. The ÖVP had sought to reduce payments to the long-term unemployed, believing such a measure would incentive work, but could not come to an agreement with their Green coalition partners.
Schools Strike
University employees went on strike Tuesday citing pay and conditions ahead of talks between unions and management over a new collective bargaining agreement. In particular, staff are opposed to the current contract situation that limits the amount of time an employee can work at any given public university to eight years.
Is Rangnick Off?
Ralf Rangnick, head coach of Austria’s national soccer team, is in contention to become Germany’s new national team director. The previous director Oliver Bierhoff resigned following Germany’s premature departure from the World Cup in Qatar.
This figure of 90,000 does not include Ukrainians, 56,500 in total, whom are classified as ‘persons displaced by war’ and are temporarily resident in Austria under European law.
Unless, of course, you have the money to buy a golden passport in Malta or Cyprus, but that’s another matter.