Europe-Middle East-Africa Refugee Crisis General Thread

[Tender Branson]

Experts here are speculating that with Hungary going tough tomorrow, the migrants will simply move to the Croatian border and then try to come via Slovenia into Austria and then to Germany.

Should only be a matter of days ...

[Tender Branson]

Austria expects 60,000 migrants to enter the country today.

http://www.welt.de/politik/deutschland/article145529161/Oesterreich-rechnet-mit-60-000-Migranten-an-einem-Tag.html

Meanwhile this has been updated to 80.000 for the next few days.

[Tender Branson]

     I think its fascinating how leaders like Fico and Zeman who were elected running from the left, are taking on pro low-immigration policies on this migrant issue.  Its encouraging to see the low immigration side find adherents from the left, not just the right.  In the US I think the last few prominent anti-amnesty, potential low immigration adherents in the Democratic Party, Senators like Byron Dorgan, Nelson from Nebraska and at one point in his career, Harry Reid, are now retired or have changed their ideology. 

Because they have no spine and own opinion. They only follow their leftist herd, which is sad.

[Tender Branson]

The Austrian broadcaster ORF today said in their main evening news show that more than 80% of Hungarians (!) backed the tough new isolationist policies of the Orban government on the border.

[Tender Branson]

The hordes of illegal (men) at the Hungarian border got a little antsy today:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RfrpwAEMe0c

[Tender Branson]

Now the illegals are bringing the war in Syria with them to the Hungarian border:

[Tender Branson]

Wow, that Reuters tweet (... is on to something):



https://twitter.com/Reuters/status/644186188132298753

Now the illegals are bringing the war in Syria with them to the Hungarian border:

[Tender Branson]

Some pictures of Hungary going tough today with water cannons, tear gas, anti-terror forces and military equipment:

















http://www.spiegel.de/fotostrecke/ungarn-gewalt-zwischen-fluechtlingen-und-polizei-fotostrecke-130150.html

[Tender Branson]

The scene here in Salzburg: About 2.000 people have arrived at the Austrian-German border, but the German police only allows groups of 50 people per hour over the border in a controlled manner. Meanwhile, the Salzburg train station is bursting with migrants and the parking garage has been transformed into a sleeping place for the day and night and it includes a provisional kindergarden:

[Tender Branson]

The scene here in Salzburg: About 2.000 people have arrived at the Austrian-German border, but the German police only allows groups of 50 people per hour over the border in a controlled manner. Meanwhile, the Salzburg train station is bursting with migrants and the parking garage has been transformed into a sleeping place for the day and night and it includes a provisional kindergarden:

If only young male adults are coming, what's the use of a kindergarten?

I never said that "only" men are coming. I said that of those who come, about 70-80% are male ...

[Tender Branson]

Not sure which of ag's replies was more childish; the deleted ad-hominem or the current "sorry-not-sorry" one

On-topic: I was very sympathetic to Hungary's position, but this is a dick move. Letting these people into the EU and then moving them to the Austrian border is not classy. When Hungary and Croatia actually assist these people in moving to the north, they are partly responsible for the problem and they should be held responsible.

http://news.sky.com/story/1555206/countries-to-open-migrant-corridor-to-germany

Orban said it's "a German problem" and it largely is now that Merkel has decided to go full moralistic vacuum cleaner of the world. Before, with the Palestinian migrant kid she was the "sorcerer" still, but with her decision to "invite" everyone in - she became the "Sorcerer's Apprentice" instead:

To quote Goethe:

You must be logged in to read this quote.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

[Tender Branson]

Josef Fritzl's house will be used as an asylum seeker centre soon, because no Austrian buyer has been found so far.

(Don't worry, the basement has been filled with concrete, so no migrant has to sleep there ...)

http://www.krone.at/Oesterreich/Fritzl-Haus_soll_Unterkunft_fuer_Fluechtlinge_werden-Koennen_einziehen-Story-472709

...

Meanwhile, Lepra has broken out at an asylum seeker camp in Salzburg:

http://www.krone.at/Oesterreich/Fall_von_Lepra_in_Salzburger_Asyl-Zeltlager-Keine_Gefahr-Story-472763

...

Also: 15.000 more migrants are expected in Burgenland today as Croatia buses them to Hungary and Hungary buses all of them to Austria. 7.000 have already arrived so far today.

[Tender Branson]

Update:

30.000 migrants are expected here for this weekend alone.

14.000 came yesterday, 10.000 today until afternoon and 6.000 more are expected in the evening.

[Tender Branson]

Update:

30.000 migrants are expected here for this weekend alone.

14.000 came yesterday, 10.000 today until afternoon and 6.000 more are expected in the evening.

Still via Hungary? How many are left in Hungary now?

Well, the migrants cannot enter Hungary via the South anymore. They are now all moving to Croatia instead. Croatia has seen an influx of 30.000 in the past few days and first called it "doable", but after they saw that 30.000 came in - they closed their borders too and bused most migrants to Hungary. Hungary didn't f**k around long, put all of them into buses as well and bused them to the Austrian border and now we have them here again.

Of the 30.000 expected this weekend, about 27.000 came via the Hungarian border and 3.000 are now also coming via the Slovenia border in the South.

To your 2nd question: Hungary is basically empty right now. All are either kept out by the Southern fence or being bused to Austria immediately. The Croatian bus drivers who bused the migrants to Hungary have been arrested there for being people smugglers ...

[Tender Branson]

Update:

30.000 migrants are expected here for this weekend alone.

14.000 came yesterday, 10.000 today until afternoon and 6.000 more are expected in the evening.

Still via Hungary? How many are left in Hungary now?

Well, the migrants cannot enter Hungary via the South anymore. They are now all moving to Croatia instead. Croatia has seen an influx of 30.000 in the past few days and first called it "doable", but after they saw that 30.000 came in - they closed their borders too and bused most migrants to Hungary. Hungary didn't f**k around long, put all of them into buses as well and bused them to the Austrian border and now we have them here again.

Of the 30.000 expected this weekend, about 27.000 came via the Hungarian border and 3.000 are now also coming via the Slovenia border in the South.

To your 2nd question: Hungary is basically empty right now. All are either kept out by the Southern fence or being bused to Austria immediately. The Croatian bus drivers who bused the migrants to Hungary have been arrested there for being people smugglers ...

Yeah, I know about he situation in Croatia (see several posts above). 30,000 was just more than I thought were still in Hungary. What do you think the Slovenian government will do now?

Slovenia has said it "intends to let 10.000 stay".

But they only have 1 asylum seeker camp in the whole country for 200 people ... (and no refugee would like to stay in beautiful Slovenia anyway, because welfare there is too low and Germany is the promised land after all).

So, they will most likely let all of them pass into Austria.

[Tender Branson]

Worth reading:

You must be logged in to read this quote.

https://mises.org/library/governments-give-migrants-disastrous-mix-social-welfare-and-bureaucracy

[Tender Branson]

Kerry announced today that the U.S. will accept 85,000 refugees in 2016, and 100,000 in 2017.


Based on the wording of the article, I'm not sure if those numbers are supposed to be a running total (i.e. the total number we will accept over 2015 - 2017 will be 100,000) or if we're supposed to add those numbers together (i.e. 10,000 in 2015 + 85,000 in 2016 + 100,000 in 2017 = 195,000 over 2015 - 2017).


Which is fantastic news The number of immigrants the U.S. accepted in 2013 fell below the 1 million mark for the first time in like 30 years or something; we need to get that number back up

Doesn't matter. It's way too low in relation to the mess the US created in the Middle-East in the last decades.

The US should take in 1 million refugees each year, not 100.000 - and do their fair share.

[Tender Branson]

The refugees’ path to Europe marked by new threat: land mines

It's possible, but still the chances for anyone to be killed by landmines in Croatia are small:

Most migrants are travelling near/or on roads and those roads and the spaces nearby have almost 100% been cleared of mines during the road construction process. Many are also travelling by bus or train.

And if 30.000 already made it into Croatia safely, there's no need to think landmines would be a greater threat than say a far-right winger running amok and killing some of them.

[Tender Branson]

We had to drive to Salzburg City today and there were no border checks whatsoever at the 2 borders to Germany at Lofer and near Bad Reichenhall at the Walserberg. Not even a single police car. And no refugees at the border either.

Picture of the Lofer border:



Picture of the Wals-Siezenheim border:



It seems they only checked the highway from and into Germany, because the radio guy mentioned a 10 mile traffic jam.

But many people use the Walserberg and the "German corner" to drive from Austria to Germany and vice-versa ...

[Tender Branson]

The Austrian parliament is currently in session and will pass a new "Asylum Law of Force" in the afternoon, proposed by SPÖVPGreens.

The law would allow the government to confiscate (unused) property in every Austrian town/city (no matter what the town's mayor or its population say) and transform it into asylum seeker quarters.

We'll see if NEOS votes with SPÖVPGreens. FPÖ and TS are voting against.

[Tender Branson]

The Austrian parliament is currently in session and will pass a new "Asylum Law of Force" in the afternoon, proposed by SPÖVPGreens.

The law would allow the government to confiscate (unused) property in every Austrian town/city (no matter what the town's mayor or its population say) and transform it into asylum seeker quarters.

We'll see if NEOS votes with SPÖVPGreens. FPÖ and TS are voting against.

Update: NEOS to vote with SPÖVPGreens.

[Tender Branson]

EU has agreed to share the 120,000 refugees. Hungary, Slovakia, Czech Republic and Romania voted against it, but it is approved by a qualified majority.

It is very unusual for EU make decisions regarding national sovereignty without unilateral consent, but obviously also unusual circumstances.

Congratulations for all right wing to far-right parties in their upcoming national elections

Yes. You can already witness it this Sunday in the Upper Austria state election, where the FPÖ is projected to surge from 15% in 2009 to 30% - or maybe even to 35% - and maybe even win the state from the ÖVP (2009: 47%) if everything plays out "right" for them.

[Tender Branson]

New development:

Homeless (Austrian citizens) have been turned away at the food distribution spots for migrants in Salzburg, with the volunteers telling them "this is only for migrants passing Austria for Germany".

The charity CARITAS, which runs the thing, later said this was a "big mistake" and that homeless Austrians "would of course also be invited to receive one meal a day at these spots" ...

[Tender Branson]

17-year old Afghani asylum seeker knifes down and kills 50-year old Turk in a park in Salzburg, after a bunch of Afghanis and Turks had a fist/knife/metal-rod fight with each other:

http://salzburg.orf.at/news/stories/2733167

These are some of the problems that our naive left-leftists on here are trying to hide under the carpet, but which will increase with these masses coming in ...

[Tender Branson]

The Austrian parliament is currently in session and will pass a new "Asylum Law of Force" in the afternoon, proposed by SPÖVPGreens.

The law would allow the government to confiscate (unused) property in every Austrian town/city (no matter what the town's mayor or its population say) and transform it into asylum seeker quarters.

We'll see if NEOS votes with SPÖVPGreens. FPÖ and TS are voting against.

New development:

Homeless (Austrian citizens) have been turned away at the food distribution spots for migrants in Salzburg, with the volunteers telling them "this is only for migrants passing Austria for Germany".

The charity CARITAS, which runs the thing, later said this was a "big mistake" and that homeless Austrians "would of course also be invited to receive one meal a day at these spots" ...

It's almost like they WANT the backlash.  Do the property owners at least get a little "rent" from the govt?

I would think so, otherwise it would go to court anyway and Austrian courts do not side with the pro-disappropriationists.

But the government will focus on public property anyway to establish asylum centres accross the country like mushrooms popping out - before they try to confiscate any private property.

But this law that is proposed today is a constitutionally changing law (SPÖVPGreensNEOS have more than 2/3 in parliament), so anything is possible. What's Austrian federalism good for, if you can just run over the mayors and over the people ? How can they be so stupid and constantly neglect the will of the people who elected them ?

You are right, it's not "almost like" they want the backlash. They definitely want it.