EU needs 'functioning system' for refugees, says senior German official
Germany, Sweden and Denmark are warning that more must be done to stop refugees entering Europe from Turkey, although they hope to ease border restrictions as soon as possible.
Senior German interior minister official Ole Schroeder said today that "our problem in Europe is that we do not have a functioning system, especially at the Turkey-Greece border".
He says a European Union plan to share refugees arriving in Greece and Italy is not working and warned that when EU responses fail "we will come to measures from the member states".
It came after talks between senior migration officials from the three countries in Brussels.
The meeting was called after Sweden introduced ID checks on all people traveling to Denmark and Denmark tightened controls on its border with Germany.
Sweden's migration minister says that the equivalent of 1,000 classrooms full of unaccompanied minors and children have arrived in the country recently seeking refuge.
Justice and migration minister Morgan Johansson said that 26,000 young migrants had come and "that is 1,000 school classes arriving in Sweden in four months".
Sweden has noted a sharp drop in migrant arrivals since photo ID checks were introduced.
Mr Johansson said that 115,000 asylum-seekers have arrived in four months, obliging Sweden to take exceptional border control measures.
Danish police say 36 of the 1,366 people they have checked for photo IDs in the past two days at the German border have been refused entry into Denmark.
The National Police added today that a person suspected of people smuggling had been detained.
Two other suspects who had been detained have been released.
