More discord in Europe as migrants cross Croatia
BERLIN — Like a river diverted, Europe’s flow of migrants and refugees on Friday surged through Croatia, which sought to hand them off to angry and resistant Hungary and Slovenia. About 15,000 voyagers were left miserable, bewildered and marooned in the small former Yugoslav republic amid the standoff.
The continent’s biggest human displacement since World War II brought more confusion and discord among the central and eastern European nations.
The passport-free zone of travel among many European states has been left in tatters by the tide of humanity passing through.
Croatia, buffeted by thousands of migrants and refugees after Hungary sealed its southern border with Serbia earlier this week, declared it could not take in any more, after initially expressing willingness to allow its territory to be used for transit to wealthier destinations to the north and west.
It sent busloads of people toward Hungary’s border, but after allowing some through, Hungarian police blocked later arrivals, news reports said.
Hungary relented and let more through, sending them straight on toward Austria, but railed at Croatia’s move, calling it “unacceptable.”
Croatia also directed migrants and refugees toward Slovenia, which deployed riot police to blockade the frontier.
Slovenia summoned the Croatian ambassador to complain, while Croatia appealed to German Chancellor Angela Merkel for help in setting a consistent policy.
The United Nations refugee agency said 4,000 people continued to pour daily into Greece.
Nearly 400,000 people have sought asylum in the European Union in the first half of the year, the European statistics agency said. Syrians and Afghans make up the largest share, but many nationalities are represented. Germany has taken in nearly 40 percent of them.
Switzerland, which is not an EU member, said Friday it would take up to 1,500 asylum seekers already registered in the “gateway” countries of Italy and Greece. But the European Union has not been able to win an accord on the distribution within the bloc of 120,000 others.
Tens of thousands of refugees and migrants have passed through Serbia and Macedonia, both relatively poor countries.
“You are not a parking lot for refugees,” EU Enlargement Commissioner Johannes Hahn told the Macedonian parliament, according to The Associated Press. “You are also victims of the situation, and we won’t abandon you.”
Pope Francis has urged Roman Catholic parishes to take in asylum-seeking families, and the Vatican said Friday that the citystate had made good on its own pledge to do so. A Syrian refugee family of four has applied for asylum in Italy and will be housed at the Vatican in the meantime.