Schengen ‘has helped terrorists’

THE EU’s open borders have helped terrorists launch attacks on the continent, JeanClaude Juncker confessed yesterday.

In a frank admission, the European Commission president said the Schengen zone had allowed extremists to move freely between countries.

But Mr Juncker said he still wanted to push ahead with plans to extend the border-free travel area to include Bulgaria, Romania and Croatia.

Terrorists involved in both the Paris and Berlin attacks were able to escape across borders into other countries thanks to the removal of checkpoints.

During an online question and answer session, Mr Juncker insisted the benefits of removing borders outweighed the dangers. ‘Border controls have been removed from some borders, but that is not an invitation to terrorists to travel freely through Europe,’ he said. ‘It’s true that occasionally terrorists do benefit from it but the prime beneficiaries are European citizens.’

The former prime minister of Luxembourg, who set out his blueprint for a European super-state on Wednesday, added: ‘I lived through a time where there were borders everywhere in Europe.

‘[Luxembourg is] a very nice country but it’s also a very small country and I had to cross borders regularly and this was a very costly and time-consuming thing.

‘Now we’ve removed those border controls and we’re being told you’re opening the borders to terrorists. No, we are opening the borders for tourists. ’

European countries that have brought back some border checks as an emergency measure following the recent attacks should remove them again soon, he added.

Belgium, France, German, Luxembourg and the Netherlands removed all checkpoints between each other 20 years ago, but the Schengen travel area has since grown to include 26 countries.

As the migration crisis has spiralled, the Schengen zone has been blamed for allowing crowds of asylum seekers to make their way uncontrolled through the continent.

Mr Juncker, who faced ridicule earlier this week for claiming Britain will regret Brexit, yesterday denied that he wanted to make the country suffer. ‘I don’t want to punish, sanction or make Britain suffer,’ he said. ‘I like the English too much.’

Giving an optimistic outlook on the likelihood of Brexit negotiations leading to a successful agreement, he added: ‘My working hypothesis is that there will be a deal.’