Worried about an uptick in the arrival of migrants, Sweden is expected to soon ask the European Commission for permission to keep its southern borders closed. The country introduced controls on its southern border in late 2015. Then, in May 2016, the Council of the European Union formally allowed some members of the Schengen Agreement, which eliminates border controls among member states, to temporarily close their doors to the massive waves of migrants entering Europe through Greece and the Balkan route. The ruling came months after several countries had unilaterally decided to restrict migrant flows into their territories.
The council's order, however, is good only through Nov. 11 unless the European Commission authorizes an extension. Under EU law, border controls can be renewed every six months, up to a maximum of two years. As of now, each of the five states taking advantage of the council's ruling — Austria, Germany, Denmark, Sweden and Norway — are angling to keep their measures in place. The Commission will likely review each of their cases before the Nov. 11 deadline.
The European Commission, on the other hand, is reluctant to extend border controls. On Oct. 13, European Commissioner for Migration Dimitris Avramopoulos said the body will assess requests from the countries concerned, but he argued against prolonged border controls, which are considered a threat to European integration. Already, on March 4, the Commission published a roadmap outlining a return to normal operations in the Schengen zone by the end of 2016. A recent report commissioned by the European Parliament estimated that re-establishing border controls inside the Schengen zone could initially cost up to 20 billion euros ($20.2 billion), plus an estimated 3 billion euros annually going forward, not counting the economic costs of disruptions to trade and tourism.
The European Commission asserts that border controls are becoming less necessary, since the new European Border and Coast Guard agency is now operational and the flow of migrants reaching Greece from Turkey has decreased with the EU-Turkey refugee deal. However, the Commission admitted in September that conditions were not ripe to end border controls yet. About 60,000 migrants are already in Greece. Returns to Turkey and relocations to other EU member states are progressing slowly, and Greece has already started transferring migrants from its islands in the Aegean to the mainland. There are fears that this could reactivate the flow of migrants along the Balkan route, despite the closure of Greece's northern borders.
Moreover, the EU-Turkey refugee deal is under pressure, since Turkey is unlikely to obtain the visa liberalization that it was promised by Brussels in exchange for preventing migrants from crossing illegally to Greece, at least not within the timeframe that was promised to Ankara. The deadline for the visa liberalization was the end of October, if Turkey fulfilled all necessary conditions. But this deadline is unlikely to be met, since Brussels argues that Turkey still needs to change its anti-terrorism law (which enables the government to crack down on opposition figures). Notably, Turkish European Affairs Minister Omer Celik said Oct. 18 that Turkey had kept its promises and was ready to stop its cooperation if Brussels does not live up to its end of the bargain.
