Merkel seeks EU help on migrants

German Chancellor Angela Merkel and her Spanish counterpart agreed yesterday to cooperate on migrant policy, saying a European approach was the only way forward as her Bavarian allies pile pressure on her to deliver a deal this week.

Merkel was due to meet her right-wing coalition partners later in the day to try to defuse a row on immigration that threatens to topple her three-month old government, days before a crunch summit of EU leaders who are also divided on the issue.

Chancellor for nearly 13 years, Merkel needs to deliver some sort of a deal at the June 28-29 EU meeting to keep her Bavarian conservative allies, the Christian Social Union (CSU), on board.

If she fails to get at least bilateral deals to ease the burden on Germany, Interior Minister Horst Seehofer, head of the CSU, has said he will defy Merkel and introduce border controls.

That could spell the end of her coalition as Merkel says such controls would be a reversal of her liberal migrant policy and deal a blow to the EU’s Schengen open-border system.

Merkel stressed she did not see an EU-wide deal this week.

‘There will be no solution for the whole asylum package,’ she told a news conference with Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, adding, however, that there was agreement on several points.